True Hyuuga Genius
by Nightblade888
Summary: To stop the Kyuubi, the Yondaime is forced to split apart a pair of twins...Hyuuga twins, and not just any Hyuuga, Hinata and her twin brother. Semisuper powered Naruto. [I don't own Naruto or any other characters you may recognize.]
1. Chapter 1

Konohagakure, more often referred to as just Konoha, was a hidden village that trained ninja for both self preservation and to accomplish missions to earn money for the village. After the third great Shinobi war, it was one of the major powers left in the region, its shinobi were among the best, the Third Hokage, the third leader of the village since its creation, was known throughout the land as 'The Professor' for his wisdom and knowledge of the ninja arts. His three students became equally famous throughout the elemental countries as the Sannin of Konoha, each of which was a formidable sight in battle. However, after the war, the most famous of all the ninja in the village was one Kazama Arashi, the Yellow Flash of Konoha.

Arashi had earned a name for himself in the war, by single handily saving a small contingent of Konoha ninja from a far superior Iwa force. Yes the legend of the Yellow flash still gave the Stone shinobi nightmares, even though the war was over. The Tsuchikage, it is said, became so enraged at the number of death certificates he had to sign after every encounter his shinobi had with Arashi, that he not only repainted his house and office so that no color that resembled or was made up of yellow was visible, but he also outlawed the use of the color all together.

Yes, in this time of peace, it was alright to be a Konoha citizen. Well, except for now. The Kyuubi, a monstrous nine tailed fox demon was attacking the city and decimating the village's ninja population. With one swing of its tails it could form tsunamis, and with a swing of another tail, a fire would erupt so large, that is made some of the volcanoes that give the fire county its name, seem like candles. Currently, Arashi was pacing his office, trying to figure out a way to circumvent the situation he had created. The only way for him to defeat the demon, was to seal its chakra and soul into a baby, for only a baby could possibly survive the shock to its chakra system that the sealing would create.

But Arashi didn't have a baby, nor did he have a girlfriend, or wife who knew any pregnant women, whose baby he could use. The Yamanaka family had given birth to a baby girl a month ago, along with the Nara family. The only other family he could think of was the Hyuuga clan heads wife; although he doubted that they would allow him to use their heir or heiress as a vessel for the demon. His train of thought was interrupted by a knock on the door.

"Come on in." Arashi commanded, assuming that it would be another report on the battle.

Instead it was Hyuuga Hiashi, the head of the prestigious Hyuuga clan.

"Hokage-sama, how goes the battle?" The formal white eyed man asked.

"The battle goes poorly, and the war just as bad." The blonde Hokage answered.

"How so?"

"I know of a way to defeat the beast, but it requires a newborn baby, and I am fresh out of baby at the moment." Arashi sighed, closing his blue eyes and rubbing them. He hadn't gotten any sleep in a while and it was beginning to show.

"I…I may have a child for you." Hiashi spoke quietly.

Arashi's eyes jerked open in shock.

"I was unaware that someone in your clan, other than your wife, was expecting, Hyuuga-sama."

"No one besides my wife is expecting, Hokage-sama." Hiashi answered the question with as little information as possible.

"You cannot be offering me your own child! Your wife isn't even due until November!" Arashi was almost yelling.

"Due to tonight's…occurrences, my wife is experiencing complications and the doctors have ordered an emergency c-section. They assured me that with care my children will be fine."

Arashi froze.

"Ch-children? As in plural? As in 'more than one child?'" He stammered. Perhaps there was hope yet for the village.

"Yes, a boy and a girl, well technically a girl and a boy. My daughter Hinata is the oldest by a minute and a half. Complete luck of the draw, the doctors tell me. But I know as well as you that they just damned Haran to a life that…that I didn't want anyone to have to live through again. So please, Hokage-sama, please…take my son…use him as your vessel…and then change his appearance…that way, that way he may escape the hatred that has plagued my brother." Hiashi broke down as much as a Hyuuga could, tears seemed to stream from his eyes and his voice was ragged with sadness.

Arashi understood. Hizashi and Hiashi were identical twins, born into the Hyuuga main house. But Hiashi was born first and Hizashi was relegated to the branch family, despite being Hiashi's equal in almost all aspects. It was quite easy to see where Hizashi's displeasure with the main house originated, and now, in one of the most ironic twists of fate Arashi had ever seen, Hiashi's own son and daughter would share the same fate…unless he took Hiashi up on his offer.

"Hyuuga-sama…I accept your proposal. I will use your son as the vessel for the demon fox, and I will change his name and appearance so that your council cannot touch him. He will be called…Uzumaki Naruto. I will place a henge on him until he is old enough…I will leave instructions with Sarutobi. Do not worry; I will arrange everything for him."

Hiashi nodded his head and exited the Hokage's office with tears still on his cheeks, and a heavy, yet lighter heart. He headed back to the hospital to check on his wife, who was still asleep after her surgery. He noticed the two cradles in the room and walked over to them. Picking up Haran, he gazed upon the face of his only son. The twins had the same hair color, a dark purplish black, and the same pale Hyuuga skin, and right now they looked identical. But Hiashi knew that his daughter would be the one that the clan council would recognize as the heiress, thus condemning his son as a branch family member.

A soft knock on the door interrupted Hiashi's musings. Walking slowly, so as not to wake his son, he opened the door to find the Yondaime standing there.

"Is that Haran?" Arashi asked.

Hiashi just nodded his head and handed the bundle to the man who would seal his son's fate.

"He is a beautiful child, he will do your family proud…weather they know it or not." Arashi's compliment was received graciously.

With those last words Arashi, Yondaime hokage disappeared to do his job, and with him he took Hyuuga Haran, son of Hyuuga Hiashi. Moments later, the sounds of the fighting stopped as the great demon Kyuubi was sealed into the boy. Along with the demon, Kazama Arashi placed another seal on the infant, one that hid his true appearance, that of a Hyuuga, and showed the world Uzumaki Naruto, miniature Yondaime.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

The years had not been the kindest to Naruto. True, his appearance as a possible son of the Yondaime had kept any _major_ outbursts of anger or rage against him minimal, but that didn't mean that he was well liked. The stares that followed the six year old boy around were colder than ice. Even in the ninja academy it wasn't much better. He was constantly picked on to answer questions that were not a part of the required curriculum, or were too advanced for most children his age to answer.

However, Naruto was far from average. Since he was three, the Sandaime had been passing scrolls onto him about various subjects, everything from anatomy to stretching exercises, to a history on all the major clans of Konoha and even some of the minor ones. Naruto was one of the most physically strong five year olds in the village thanks to the scrolls he had received, the last one dealing with chakra manipulation and control. This was something that Naruto seemed to have problems with, yet in reality he was a natural at controlling his chakra. He wasn't sure why, but the tree walking exorcize seemed to be easier than he had anticipated. Today was Naruto's six birthday, and while normally he would wander around the town before the festival celebrating the defeat of the Kyuubi, today he was headed towards the Sandaime's office. The old man had requested that Naruto stop by so that he could give him a birthday present.

Ignoring the glare he received from the secretary, Naruto knocked on the large door to the office and waited for the Hokage to let him in.

"Come in Naruto-kun." The voice of the elderly fire shadow called the young boy into his office.

"You wanted to see me?" Naruto asked politely.

"Yes, yes, please sit down, how was your day?" Sarutobi asked, motioning for Naruto to take a seat at a table off to the side of the office that wasn't overflowing with paperwork

"It was alright, I suppose, the teacher kept asking me stupid questions about the Kyuubi, and then yells at me when I couldn't answer a question about the seven tailed demon. I mean come on! No one knows much about the Shichibi!" Naruto took the glass of water that the Hokage offered him and downed it quickly. He then handed him two scrolls and an envelope. Opening the first scroll, he found it was an introduction into the art of seal making while the second scroll was a continuation of the first. The envelope contained his usual allowance money, plus some extra and a number of coupons for free ramen at his favorite restaurant.

"Thank you!" Naruto was extremely happy about his gifts, especially the scrolls and ramen coupons.

"Naruto, I have something I must tell you, for I made a promise to the Yondaime." Sarutobi took a big breath before he began his tale.

"When the Kyuubi was attacking the village, the Yondaime made a decision. He knew he couldn't kill the demon the best he could hope for was to seal it. The problem was that he needed a medium to seal it in."

"Me…Yondaime-sama needed me to seal the Kyuubi, didn't he?" Naruto's voice was small and weak. All of the glares made sense, all of the names he was called when people didn't think he was listening. It explained why the villagers seemed to hate him more than usual on his birthday.

"Yes. He needed a new born child so that the chakra of the demon would eventually meld with the developing chakra system of the child. I know that the villagers only see you as the demon, they don't see you as a person, but you are human, and you are a hero, just like the Yondaime wanted." Sarutobi monitored Naruto carefully as the information was digested into the energetic boy.

"Sarutobi-sama, can I ask why Yondaime-sama chose me as the vessel?" Naruto asked, curiosity shinning in his eyes.

'Naruto…I hope you don't take this poorly.' Sarutobi braced himself for the possible backlash that was about to come. "My predecessor didn't choose you exactly…you were…volunteered…by your father. He wanted to save you from the life that his brother led, so he convinced the Yondaime to use you as the vessel. He wanted what was best for you."

Naruto just sat there staring at his empty glass and thinking. It was up to Sarutobi to break his thoughts.

"Naruto-kun, would you like to see what you really look like?"

Naruto's head shot up with a jerk. "You mean I don't really look like this?" He demanded.

Sarutobi just nodded. "Please Naruto-kun; could you take off your shirt, I will remove the seal on your appearance."

Naruto complied and immediately started looking for a seal. Why hadn't he noticed it sooner? Surely he would have noticed a seal on his body…right?

The Sandaime stepped behind the boy and bit his thumb, drawing blood. He quickly swiped the blood over a small seal on the boy's shoulder blade. It was nothing more than a dot, so small that it resembled a mole. Not for the first time Sarutobi was reminded of what a great seal craftsman the Yondaime was. The appearance of a blonde boy with wide blue eyes and whiskers on his cheek wavered, before it vanished completely revealing Hyuuga Haran for the first time in six years.

Naruto's now white eyes danced around the room, searching for a mirror. He found a near full length mirror hidden away in the corner of the room. Stepping up to it, he was astonished by the change.

His once bright yellow hair was now the same color as a girl he remembered from class, Hyuuga Hinata. He now even had the same eyes as her! His skin was still tanned slightly, but it seemed to be softer now, as if his skin was meant to be pale. Most importantly, those whiskers were gone from his face completely. The skin they once occupied was blank and revealed a 'dignified bone structure', whatever that meant. In short Naruto now looked like a Hyuuga through and through.

"So, I guess this explains why chakra manipulation and control was much easier than I expected." He stated, still shocked at his appearance. "Hey, don't you think that I look kind of like that girl, Hinata, from my class?" He asked the Hokage.

Sarutobi chuckled. "I suppose you do, after all, you two are fraternal twins."

Naruto very nearly fell to the floor in shock.

"Hinata is my twin sister?" He chocked out. Then something clicked in his head. "Wait, she must be the older of the two…because if my father volunteered me…it must mean that I was going to receive that branch family seal I read about."

Sarutobi laughed at the expression on the boys face. "Yes, you were younger than Hinata by one minute; your mother had an emergency delivery due to the Kyuubi. You two weren't expected until November."

"Then why does everyone celebrate Hinata…nee-chan's birthday in December?" Naruto asked.

"That is one thing I do not know." The Sandaime answered truthfully. "By the way, I suppose you want your real name to go with your real identity, right?"

Naruto nodded his head furiously.

"Your parents named you Hyuuga Haran."

Naruto almost burst out laughing. "Hinata and Haran, huh? Sunny and Stormy, that's a hoot!"

A while later, Sarutobi watched as Haran walked out of his office with a smile on his face. They had agreed to keep up the Naruto façade until the clan council couldn't hurt his family. While a henge would be easiest to do, dying his hair and buying contacts would be the best way to hide his appearance. The transformation technique can be canceled, dropped, or seen through, after all.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Over at the Hyuuga Clan compound, the mood was somber. The majority of the clan was celebrating the defeat of the Kyuubi and mourning the loss of the Yondaime and the number of Hyuuga that had died in the attack. Hiashi was once again doubting his choice to allow his son to be used in the sealing process. He had seen the looks of disgust the villagers showed his son. He wondered if he hadn't saved him from servitude only to send him to hell.

Hinata was training by herself, something she often did on October 10th, her birthday had no happy memories, from loosing her brother to the Kyuubi attack, it was no wonder her father picked December 27th as the day to celebrate her birth. Or it could have been because she was born at 12:27 in the morning; she wasn't sure and frankly didn't care. She always wondered what would have happened if Haran had been born first. Surely he would be a better heir than her. She was constantly being told by various members of the clan that she was weak, and they wished that it had been her that disappeared instead of her brother.

For all his worry about his son, Hiashi had never noticed the harsh comments his daughter received. It puzzled him that she could go from being near perfect in her forms one week and terrible in them the next. He decided that he would train her specifically to help her. It was while he was planning out her training schedule that a small bird with a note tied to its leg landed on his study windowsill. Untying the letter, he read the neat handwriting that he had come to associate with Sarutobi. When he was done, he immediately destroyed both the note and his training program for Hinata. He began to work feverishly on a new schedule, the contents of the note running through his mind over and over. It had said very simply: **_He knows._**

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: This is the result of a rather nasty plot bunny that got stuck in my mind around, oh beginning of summer, and just wouldn't dislodge itself. To those who may worry about Naruto of the Mirage have no fear, chapter 16 is nearly done and will be out at latest Wed, in some form or another. This story will be multi-chaptered, but don't expect updates very often. My concentration is on Mirage and school work, I just wanted to get this down on virtual paper. Please review; I'll never know how insane my mental ramblings are without outside input.)**


	2. Chapter 2

The day after his birthday, 'Naruto' showed up at the academy with dark circles under his eyes. As well as he handled things in front of the Hokage, when he returned home to his apartment, he quickly broke down. His own father had cursed him to the life he was leading. The Hyuuga branch seal sounded like a dream after the pain the villager's ignorance had caused him. He had spent so much time brooding that the night slipped away and he hadn't slept at all, or had time to dye his hair. Furthermore, he still couldn't decide which would be worse, the branch family seal, or the Kyuubi. One thing he knew was that he wouldn't take both. Even if it meant never seeing his family, he wouldn't take the **Hyuuga bunke juinjutsu**.

Sitting in class, his attention turned to his sister. Hinata was sitting quietly, reading a book while ignoring the clamor of the classroom while waiting for the teacher to start class. He didn't know much about his sister, other than she was the heiress of the Hyuuga clan and was born a minute before he was. He knew she was quiet and shy, although he didn't know why, and he knew that there was another Hyuuga in the academy, one year above both of them. He quickly resolved himself to find out more about her…after he took a nice nap.

Hinata wasn't actually reading a book. Well, she was reading, but the book was just a cover. Instead of the normal pages, there was her new schedule for training with her father. Normally, she would train with her father only if he wasn't busy, and when he was, she would train with a branch family member or watch over her younger sister, Hanabi. The curious thing about her new schedule was that it involved learning things other than the jyuken taijutsu style that she was becoming used to. Space was set aside for specific techniques that would be needed for graduation as well as sealing. She knew the purpose behind the sealing exercises, the **bunke juinjutsu**. The thought of the seal brought back thoughts of her brother. If he had survived, he would have the seal placed on him to serve as her protector. But that didn't make any sense, it was the older sibling's responsibility to protect the younger, not the other way around. Suddenly, she felt as if someone was watching her. She quietly activated her byakugan by forming the required hand seals. She wasn't good enough to do it without them yet, a fact that the council members never forgot to mention when they observed her.

The culprit was none other than Uzumaki Naruto. She didn't know much about him, just that he was an orphan (which the teachers liked to point out) and that he was loud. But in the instance when she saw him through the black and white view of her blood limit, she saw sadness, anger, and uncertainty pass through his features. Another thing that she knew was that under no circumstance was Uzumaki Naruto uncertain. She resolved herself to find out what could make the boy feel that way…after she finished her training.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

As Naruto was leaving the academy he noticed that the Sandaime was waiting for him over by his favorite swing.

"Hello, Naruto-kun how was your day?" The old man asked

"Alright, I…didn't get much sleep last night, so…" he broke of, trying to stifle a yawn.

'It seems that he took it worse than it appeared.' Sarutobi thought, before putting an arm around the boy and leading him back to his office.

Hinata noticed the closeness of the duo and noted it to herself, before scampering back to the compound for her training. But when she arrived, she discovered that her father wasn't there.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Upon reaching Sarutobi's office, Naruto was shocked to discover Hyuuga Hiashi sitting down, as if waiting for them. The shock of seeing his father, and realizing that he would have to talk with him made him drop the **Henge** he had been using all day.

"O-Otousan!" He stammered, not sure what to do or say. He got the urge to both attack and flee from the man.

"Haran…I –I wish to apologize for my decision." The son was astounded that his father would apologize. Sure, maybe someday, but not right off the bat. "I am sorry to say that I thought you would be better off the container of a demon than with the branch family seal. When I see the response of the villagers…not a day goes by that I don't second guess my decision. Will you ever be able to forgive me for separating you from your family?"

Naruto/Haran was speechless. He was having a rather hard time incorporating these dual personalities, and the fact that he had the head of 'the strongest clan in Konoha' asking for his forgiveness was something that he wasn't used to in either role.

"Otousan…I-I just don't know… the Naruto part of me wants to desperately have a family, as does the Hyuuga part of me…but I don't know that I can forgive you…at least now. Perhaps later, but…I just don't know."

That was about as good as Hiashi was expecting. He knew deep down that his son wasn't going to be able to forgive him immediately

"I understand. Please allow me to train you, in an attempt to make up for my error." Haran couldn't believe his ears, his father was basically pleading to train him!

"Of course I'd like to get training! I don't know much about the Hyuuga fighting style, and even less about the byakugan."

Hiashi smiled. There was still a chance for him to make up for the decision he made.

"I was going to train your sister today; however, I think it would be best if the two of you got reacquainted. If you want, that is."

Haran just nodded his head before excusing himself to use the restroom before training.

"A word of advice, Hiashi-sama," Sarutobi addressed the stoic man. "He has more energy than any shinobi I have ever known, so for a Hyuuga, he will seem extremely hyper. In short, he will run you ragged!" There was a smile on the old man's lips that showed how funny he thought the situation was.

Haran re-entered the room and fell into step behind Hiashi as he exited.

"Haran, it will not do to train inside the Hyuuga compound. If you are seen it will raise too many alarms. Go to training area forty-four. No one will see us there. I will go collect your sister."

Haran nodded before leaping away toward the designated training area, the forest of death.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Hinata was walking through the garden of the Hyuuga estates, not concentrating on anything in particular, when her father's voice sounded from the entrance.

"Hinata, I'm sorry I wasn't here earlier, something important came up. Come with me, we will begin your training. I have selected a rather…familiar sparing partner for you."

Hinata nodded her head and followed her father. She grimaced internally as she assumed that it would be her cousin Neji that she would be fighting. She could never beat him, no matter what she did. In retrospect, she would never be so happy to be wrong.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Hinata was confused. Her father had told her that he would train her, yet so far all they had done was walk out of the Hyuuga compound and head towards a seemingly random training area. She supposed the fact that they were sneaking around could be considered training, but something told her that it wasn't a part of an exercise.

The first thing that Hinata noticed when she entered the forest of death was how incredibly large everything seemed. She continued to follow her father, who had activated his byakugan, deeper into the forest until he stopped a few hundred meters in.

"I am impressed, that is very convincing for someone your age."

Hinata was confused. Surely he hadn't been complimenting her, but…then who? There wasn't anyone around. She activated her byakugan and saw a dome of chakra, right where there had been a fallen tree trunk. Cutting off the chakra flow to her eyes she gazed at her father with an inquisitive look on her face.

"Otousan, what is that?" She asked staring at the tree trunk and simultaneously holding onto her father's hand.

"That is what you will see every time you see someone use a **henge** through your byakugan. Now if he would be so kind as to drop it, it is time you met your sparing partner."

The illusion quickly disappeared revealing a boy with spiky dark hair and white/lavender eyes. He wore orange pants that were just like Naruto's along with a black shirt…and had the same hair style…but he was definitely a Hyuuga, the byakugan was enough proof.

"I'm afraid that it's time I come clean about something Hinata…Haran, he isn't dead…or missing…just hidden so that the council cannot find him. I made a choice when you were born to hide him, hide him so that the council couldn't force their seal onto him like they did your uncle and your cousin. The Yondaime hid him away under the guise of one of your classmates."

'Niisan is…is alive? He's one of my classmates? He…oh dear its' "Naruto…I mean Haran-niisan!" The normally timid girl raced at, what could be considered 'break-neck speed', at her long lost sibling before tackling him to the ground in a hug and crying.

"Nee-sama…I…I-"He was cut off by his sister's sobs.

After a few minutes, Hinata calmed down enough to speak normally. "You don't have to call me nee-sama, otouto; the council is always telling me how you would make a better heir than I."

"That's a lie! I don't even know anything about using our blood limit. The scrolls that the Hokage gave me just covered the history of the different clans, nothing about using any techniques. Besides, I doubt they'd say that if they knew…"

Hiashi had stood their watching his offspring reacquaint themselves after six long years. The news that the clan council had been sabotaging his daughter's training came as a shock and he would find a way to correct that. He cleared his throat to break the silence.

"Hinata, I am sorry to hear that the council has been doing such things, I will work on a way to fix that. However, now is the time for training, so Hinata I want you to work on your forms, while I teach your brother how to activate his byakugan."

Hinata nodded and walked over to the trunk her brother had been sitting on and began to practice as she watched through her byakugan as her brother attempted to awaken his own eyes.

"The Hokage tells me that you have already done the tree climbing exercise, is that correct?" Hiashi was trying to figure out the extent of his son's abilities.

"Hai and I've started on water walking, but haven't had too much time to work on that."

"Tree walking will be sufficient control to activate the byakugan. To do so, you must channel increasing amounts of chakra into the area around your eyes. Your body will naturally move the chakra to the specific pathways, but you must start small! If you use too much chakra you will overload the pathways. Best case scenario you get a giant headache from blowing out the pathways around your eyes, making you useless to the clan. Worst case scenario, you blow out your eyes, making you worthless to the clan."

Haran gulped; he never knew that activating his byakugan could result in the destruction of his eyes.

"The trick is to start very small, and slightly increase the amount of chakra until your eyes activate. As you become better at manipulating your chakra you can learn to activate your eyes without hand seals. Once you've activated your eyes for the first time, I will teach you the seals that will allow you to use just the correct amount to activate the byakugan."

Haran took his time and followed his father's directions carefully and slowly. After a few minutes he was successful in activating his bloodline limit. The bulging veins around his eyes made the nondescript lavender stand out around his face. The sensation he received was amazing. He could see very far away, as if he were looking through binoculars. He could see the chakra pathways of his father and sister and for the briefest of seconds; he thought he could see the tenketsu on his sister's hand as she attacked her target.

"Very impressive…you were able to grasp the idea of that quickly. Now, let us begin the true training."

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

A very tired Haran drug himself through the door of his apartment. He had worked himself into the ground trying to catch up to Hinata when it came to the jyuken. It sure was a demanding style, hardly any of the information he had read about it did it justice. One good thing was that the information that Sarutobi had given him on anatomy were extremely helpful by itself, and when combined with the jyuken just made closing tenketsu easier. It would be tough work, but Hyuuga Haran didn't know the meaning of the word quit. It was too bad that he was forced to keep up the identity of Uzumaki Naruto, but if it protected his neesan than it was worth it.

Hinata was just as happy and as tired as her brother. She wasn't such a failure after all! Her father had told her that for her age her jyuken was good. It might not be at her cousin's level, but then he was a year older. She was sad that Haran couldn't live with them, but she wouldn't force him to accept the branch seal just for her own gain. She could be with him during class and when they were training, as long as they were careful that no one spotted them. That night, both twins went to bed happier than they had been in years, looking forward to tomorrow.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: WOW! I was surprised that so many of you liked this story. I figured that it would just sort of float behind Mirage, but so many people reviewed and said they loved it. The idea just struck me, when I was thinking about ways to explain away Hinata's attraction to Naruto without it being love. Guess it struck a chord somewhere. Anyway, I hope you like this chapter, it is a bit smaller than I usually write, but 5-6 pages is about as long as the chapters will get for awhile. If you want you can suggest pairings, but right now it will be Haran/Ino. I just like that. Please review and I'll keep writing.)**


	3. Chapter 3

What a difference a year can make! When Hiashi looked back at the previous year, he was astounded by the progress that both Haran and Hinata made. He had anticipated that Haran would need at least a year and a half to catch up to Hinata, in terms of skills with the jyuken, but was surprised when his only son caught up with his eldest daughter in one year. Both twins could were skilled in the art of the gentle fist, and had far superior taijutsu to any academy student. Both had the ninjutsu skills necessary to pass the gennin exam at any moment, and both were very smart for their age. In terms of skills that the clan would find useful, Hinata, despite her quiet nature and thirst to please everyone, showed signs of being a very strong diplomat. It was the very nature that the council had reprimanded her for that drove her to end conflicts so that both parties were sated. It was because of this nature that she hid her true proficiency in the jyuken, so that her sister wouldn't be branded with the **bunke juinjutsu**.

Haran had found his strengths in jyuken and in his clan's history. Jyuken offered him something that he could be good at and receive recognition in, while clan history was used to often help his sister in her mock negotiations, as well as further his own research into the reasons his father left him to the fate of being a demon container. But it wasn't just his own clan, but the other clans that had won fame throughout the ninja villages, like the Aburame, Uchiha, and Kaguya to name a few. Haran's memory was excellent when it came to recalling facts and especially laws. He had met his youngest sister, Hanabi twice, she was very young and couldn't participate in the rigorous training that her older sibling were required to do.

Hanabi had just turned two in March, which was when Haran had first been introduced to his other sister. Hanabi didn't have any of the physical characteristics of the twins, from her dark black hair and features that took after their father, while the twins took after their mother. Hanabi was growing quickly, like any child, and would begin learning jyuken in a year's time. Unfortunately, Hanabi's birthday, also marked the day that Haran's mother, Hyuuga Sora fell into a coma and began to waste away. Haran was very depressed when he saw the state his mother was in. Who wouldn't be, to see their mother slowly wasting away, her muscles dying, her body becoming smaller, despite the best treatments of the doctors.

In most maters, the duo of Haran and Hinata acted like...well...twins. Their Jyuken was on par with one another, with Haran holding the edge in one on one matches due to his stamina. But things like height, favorite colors and other such matters, they were nearly identical. Even at school, they were able to act like twins, right under the noses of their class mates and teachers.

The only sign that something was different in the lives of either of the two, at least outwardly, was that Hinata suddenly developed a 'crush' on 'Uzumaki Naruto'. This was obviously a ploy to allow Hinata to be around her brother without garnering too much suspicion, even if it did become some what of a joke among the kunoichi of her class. Speaking of kunoichi, two certain girls were in the middle of a heated argument.

"No way Ino-pig! I saw him first!"

"Did not, forehead girl, I did!"

"No you didn't! He's mine all the way!"

"Hah! Like he'd go out with someone who's forehead is as big as yours!"

This conversation wasn't unusual to any villager or shinobi that passed the fighting duo of Haruno Sakura and Yamanaka Ino. Their battles over the affections of Uchiha Sasuke were legendary, and this type of rivalry hadn't been seen before between kunoichi of their age. Yep, this line of arguing would go one for blocks as the two walked down the road toward the Yamanaka flower shop.

However, today, the fight would change. Today, the duo would find a new boy to hero worship.

Sakura wouldn't normally be hanging around with Ino, but her parents had 'volunteered' the pink haired girl to help around the flower shop to 'teach her the value of hard work'.

'I would rather be taught the value of hard work from a loud crazy guy wearing green spandex, than work with Ino-pig!' Sakura ranted inside her mind.

'I hope Sakura gets over that stuck up, cold Uchiha.' Ino lamented. She didn't really care for the kid, she thought he was too cold and had something shoved up his butt. She was only pretending to like him, so that Sakura could gain some confidence. If Ino was her competition, it would be easier than if it were other girls. Of course, every girl in Konoha was after Sasuke, well everyone but Hinata, but still, with Ino as her main competition, Sakura was able to be more confident around other people.

The two girls were sitting behind the counter of the shop, they weren't allowed to handle the register, but they would go help people, or fetch flowers from the back if Ino's parents needed anything. Ino's father, Inoichi was out on a mission, but was expected back in a day or two, and Ino's mother was upstairs when the door opened, and the bells attached to it jingled.

"Welcome to Yamanaka Flowers, can I help you?" Ino asked, without looking at the customer.

"Not right now, I'm just looking." The customer replied. His voice was young, and Ino thought that he sounded about her age, but she didn't recognize the voice.

'Must be a civilian.' She thought, looking up long enough to see the back of the boy's head, which was a dark purplish.

For a while there was silence, as the new comer just walked around and looked at the various arrangements of flowers, while the two girls, ignored him in favor of doing homework (Sakura) or reading (Ino).

"I think I'll take these." The boy said, and placed a pot filled with white Bleeding Hearts.

"I'll go get your mom, Ino." Sakura murmured as she ran upstairs to fetch the blonde women.

Barely looking up at the flowers, Ino quickly asked "What do you want those for, anyway?"

"There, for my mom…she's in the hospital." The boy responded with a slight hint of sadness creeping into his voice, as Ino's mom descended from the stairs.

"You know they're slightly toxic, you need to be careful when you handle them." Ino warned.

"Ino, that was unnecessary, he's been coming here for the past three months to buy these flowers for his mom, I'm sure he knows about them by now!" Her mom scolded her and Ino had the decency to blush a slight crimson at the reprimand.

Sakura looked at the boy from her position at the bottom of the stair well. He had dark hair, but instead of dark eyes like one might suspect his were a light blue, that bordered on nearly transparent. He looked rather cute in her opinion, his eyes and hair contrasting with each other, and his slightly tanned skin spoke of the amount of time he spent outside.

'Wait, I did not just think that this kid was cute! Sasuke-kun is cute, this kid is…well he's…I mean…ok, so he might be cute, but not as much as Sasuke! Wait, I meant Sasuke-kun!' Sakura's inner monologue wasn't noticed by anyone as she stared at the newcomer.

Ino finally looked up at the customer, and was floored. This kid wasn't cute, he was hot! Well, as hot as a seven year old can be. His hair clashed with his eye color in a way that screamed 'FAKE' but it was so small that it didn't seem like it. He was a bit on the skinny side, but just underneath the black shirt he wore, she could make out the faint indention of muscles that screamed 'SHINOBI' to the trained eye.

She hadn't noticed that the boy had paid and was leaving the store, until her mother wished him a good day. Whipping her head around, Ino blurted out the first (sane) thing that came to her mind.

"Hey, what is your name?" She spoke rapidly, as if trying to cover something up.

The boy in question just turned around and locked eyes with her, before giving his reply.

"Haran." He said before quickly disappearing out of the shop.

Haran's less than adequate response to Ino's question, left the blond dumbfounded, and gave Sakura some decent ammunition on her friend for their next argument over Sasuke.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

After his escape from the flower shop, Haran quickly made his way towards the hospital, via the rooftops of the neighboring houses and businesses. He entered the hospital and nodded at the receptionist who has accustomed to seeing the boy enter around this time every week. She wasn't sure where he went, as every attempt to follow him was unsuccessful, but she didn't really care too much. If someone was in the hospital, then their friends and family had every right to see them.

Haran walked to his mother's room, before making sure that no one was around and double checked with a quick scan using his byakugan. Satisfied that no one would see him enter, he opened the door and entered, but didn't drop the henge he had over his eyes until the door was fully closed.

Hyuuga Sora lay in the bed, in the exact same position as the last time he had visited. Her dark bluish black hair was long and pooled around her waist. Placing this weeks offering next to the last one, which was looking a bit dry, he took a chair and sat next to his mother. After a bit of silence, Haran took his mom's left hand and placed his inside it, wondering what his mother's touch would feel like if there were life behind it.

For a long time he didn't say anything, he just held onto his mother as if the world would end if he let go.

"Tou-san said that Nee-chan and I were ready to start learning more advanced forms…I…I think you'd be really proud of Nee-chan, she's been getting better and better all the time, and not just at fighting…something tells me you wouldn't like that too much…she's amazing at the political stuff…she beats me every time. Tou-san says I have this thing, where I always have to be right, so I don't make as good as a negotiator…he's right, I think."

Things went silent again, Haran just looked at the floor or out the window, he didn't dare look at his mother's face. His mother was renown throughout the clan as a fearsome fighter, but an even more feared seal mistress. She had been working on a way to remove the branch family seal, but that information was very restricted, even to the wife of the clan head. It didn't help that she was born into the branch family either. If one looked at the face of the comatose women, they would be easily able to see the faint mark of the seal, still visible on her forehead, even today. The seal was removed when she married Hiashi, but the imprint remained.

Giving into his urges, Haran finally looked at his mother's face. Her pale skin nearly hid the long since healed scars from the seals removal, but if you knew where to look they were as plain as day. Tears began to well up in Haran's eyes, as he looked at his mother's face, a face that he had deprived both his sisters of.

It was two years ago, on March 27th, that the distrust and general hatred of the villagers boiled over. It was a day that was so unassuming that no one thought to be on the look out for 'Naruto's' health, not even the boy himself. It started out a bit rough, he had woken up a bit late and was running as fast as he could through the town to make it to the orphanage he live at until he was given his current apartment by the Sandaime. He turned the corner to take a short cut towards the building, when suddenly, he was tripped up by the leg of a store owner, one who had always over charged him for what little he wanted or could afford to buy. As he slid along the ground, Naruto felt various scrapes and cuts form on his body, as small rocks and pebbles dug into his young skin. But the pain he felt from those would be minimal compared what was just around the bend. The force of his momentum sent his body skidding directly into the side of a neighboring stand. This bump startled the cart that the vendor was transporting his wares in and sent the animals still attached into a frenzy. The beasts bucked into the air and pulled forward, only for their reigns to pull them in the opposite direction, right towards Naruto.

He heard the commotion and tried to get up and move out of the way, but the trip he had taken tweaked his ankle, and moving was difficult. He was forced to try and crawl away, but was only partially successful. The wheels of the cart rolled directly over his legs, breaking the young boy's femur in half.

It is said that the femur is the most painful bone to break, because when the bone snaps, the muscles of the leg are so strong, that they contract and force the bones to grate against each other as they rocket in opposite directions, tearing muscle and connective tissue in the process.

Naruto was quickly rushed to the hospital by one of the newer vendors in the area, where he was placed in a room and given some pain killers, while his bones were pulled back into position. It must have been a busy day for the hospital, because after his legs had been straightened back out and set, he was moved into a room next to a recovering Hyuuga Sora.

It was this experience, seeing her son laid out with two broken legs because of the village, that had sent her into her catatonic state, Haran was sure of it. He blamed himself for causing this situation and no one could convince him other wise. Of course, no one else knew about his theory, but he wasn't planning on telling anyone soon.

Wiping the tears from his eyes, Haran once more donned his disguise and left his mother's side.

"I'm sorry that you have to see me like this all the time." He said, standing at the door, "but until my sisters are out of harm's reach, you will have to see me like this. But one day, I will drop this accursed mask and I know that on that day, you will wake back up…to see your family…and me." The last two words were added as an after statement, but he wanted them to be true none the less.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Thanks for the support of my last couple chapters! I really appreciate the reviews you send me, and I hope you will keep them coming. This chapter was a bit difficult to get out, but I hope you like it, I decided (after a long and hard debate which was decided by a coin flip) to keep Haran's mother alive, as she will move the main sub plot along much better. I don't normally do this, but I'm going to give you guys a teaser/general idea of where this story will go.**

**By the time this story reaches the Naruto II arc, most of the action will be about the Hyuuga family and their various problems, with a bit of ninja action thrown in. I'm hoping to make this a deeper fic rather than a fighting one. **

**That's just a heads up; it won't be for a while. I hope everyone has a good holiday season, no matter which holiday it is.)**


	4. Chapter 4

The years passed quickly for the Hyuuga twins, both began to grow at an alarming rate, as most children do as they reach their teenage years, Haran was quickly approaching five feet, and his academy graduation was just around the corner! Hinata had made her way towards four feet eight inches, with probably another five or six inches before she quit growing, a healthy size for a kunoichi. Haran had firmly cemented himself as the foremost practitioner of the jyuken style, among the ages of ten to sixteen, being able to defeat other Hyuuga, four years older than himself was a feat that even Neji hadn't accomplished, though Hiashi figured it wouldn't be too much longer before the genius of the branch family, and the genius without a family were destined to fight for supremacy.

Hinata had also progressed well in the family art, just not as far as Haran; of course, having to constantly hide her true abilities, being a bit behind wasn't always bad. She was always training with Hanabi, who was now almost seven, and would be entering the academy shortly. Hiashi had assured them that they were as powerful as Neji was, and that the only difference that should exist between them, was the differences in jounin instructors.

Hinata's grades in school were contrasting with her brothers, his were in the lower quartile, and hers, the upper, but that was by design. The twins were aiming to be on the same gennin team, and this was the only way to guarantee that.

The main reason that Haran's grades were so low, was due to his own training schedule, and his weekly visits to see his mother, who hadn't gotten any better in the nearly six years since he began visiting her. He chuckled silently to himself whenever he would overhear Ino or Sakura talk about "this really cute guy who we saw…once…about five years ago…" It was quite comical actually; even when they tried to catch him again, he simply did the easy thing, and got the flowers delivered to the hospital where he would pick them up.

It was the day before the academy exit exam to become gennin and all the members of the graduating class were feeling the stress of the times. A few amongst the hopeful children weren't under as much pressure as the others. Aburame Shino was sure he could pass the exam, as long as the test covered the information the teachers had given, he would pass. Uchiha Sasuke was also sure he would pass, although that was more because he was a bit arrogant, and not because he was thinking clearly. Nara Shikamaru wasn't thinking much at all, while his best friend Akimichi Chouji wasn't worried one way or the other. The twins weren't worried in the least, their father had told them repeatedly over the past few years that they could have taken the test at any time and passed, but they declined, opting to be on a team with a third member that they knew.

That day their sensei, Umino Iruka, was testing them on the basic techniques that they might be tested on for the exam. They had gone over the written portion and were moving onto the actual ninja techniques.

"Alright, we're going to review the **henge** (transformation) today, everyone make a line in the front." He ordered.

The twenty or so students in his section moved to the front of the class and waited for Iruka to call off their names so they could perform the exercise. After a few minutes, and a good number of students, Iruka reached Naruto.

Haran had been using a combination of henge and hair dye along with blue tinted contacts to conceal his identity for the past three and a half years or so, so this wasn't hard for him in the least. Molding a small amount of chakra, he concentrated hard on the image he wanted to take, before making his move.

"Henge!" He roared, as a large puff of smoke obscured the blond as all the students waited to see what form the class clown would take.

The smoke began to clear, and where an exact replica of Iruka should have been…an exact replica of a naked female Iruka stared at the real teacher, a light blush marring her tan skin.

"Do I pass, Iruka-sensei?" 'She' asked in a seductive tone, followed by a healthy amount of eyelash batting.

Iruka, who wasn't prepared for this at all, immediately was propelled to the ground by a gusher of blood, stemming from his nose. Naruto dropped his transformation and grinned at the twitching sensei.

"How do you like my 'Sexy no jutsu'? The boy asked, not expecting a response. When he didn't receive one, he immediately became outraged.

"Iruka-sensei! Don't tell me you're turned on by a female version of you! That's wrong on about seventy or eighty different levels!" This got a laugh from some of the boys, but the entire female population, Hinata included, were shooting him venomous looks that screamed for retribution. Seeing the writing on the wall, Naruto helped his sensei back to his feet and handed the brown haired instructor a couple of tissues to plug his nose with. Once the normally jovial teacher was back and moving, Naruto was forced to flee from the class or else face the wrath of the angry chuunin.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

The next day came and brought along the exams. Haran and Hinata weren't worried about them as they had not only learned the material already but had accumulated enough points throughout their time at the academy that it would take a choke of monumental proportions to drop them from the ranks of graduates.

Fortunately, no such occurrence would happen. Haran passed his exam easily enough and ended up in a good position to be on the same team as his sister, with Either Aburame Shino or Inuzuka Kiba as their teammate. Haran was hoping for Shino, as he could be trusted to keep secrets better than Kiba. The teams wouldn't be announced until the next day, so the twins went about their normal training schedule.

Haran was heading towards his appointment when he noticed a quick movement out of the corner of his eye. He quickly activated his bloodline and was able to identify Mizuki, another teacher at the academy, making a bee-line towards the edge of Konoha with a large scroll strapped to his back. Haran recognized a seal on the outside of the scroll signifying it as the property of the Hokage and quickly took to the rooftops to intercept the thief. For a chuunin, Mizuki was rather slow; always favoring brawn over swiftness and so Haran was able to catch up after a short chase that put the two in the middle of a forest. Not wanting to waste the first opportunity to take down his target, Haran made a quick decision and threw a kunai in front of his former teacher.

Mizuki's day was finally looking up. First off, the demon brat had managed to pass the genin exams, thus depriving Mizuki his chance to have the brat steal the scroll for him. Then there was the security around the scroll, it had taken Mizuki a long time for the staff around the Hokage's office to get used to his appearance late at night so that they would just write him off as a non threat. After escaping from the building he quickly made his way away from the city of Konoha towards the forest where he could escape this prison and join his master. However, his escape was halted by a single kunai that flew in front of him and forced him to slow down for a crucial second. In that moment of hesitation, Haran was able to catch the snow haired sensei from behind in a **Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou** that sealed off his chakra flow almost completely. He wouldn't be able to perform any techniques for quite a while.

Mizuki fell to the ground, out of energy from having his chakra pathways cut off. He felt his attacker remove the scroll of forbidden seals from his back. He felt another sharp strike to a point on his neck and before his world fell into black, he caught a flash of yellow hair.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Haran was sitting next to his sister, his preferred seat of choice for anytime he had to be at the academy, he was waiting for Iruka-sensei to announce the genin teams. After the incident with Mizuki last night, Haran was a touch tired, after a long days work out, but mostly he was excited. In return for stopping a traitor and retrieving the scroll, the Hokage had rewarded the young Hyuuga by promising to teach him the first technique from the scroll, the **Kage bunshin no jutsu** (Shadow clone technique). Haran didn't think he needed the technique, but he was always interested in learning new ones. He was daydreaming all through Iruka's speech and didn't listen to anything other than his inner ramblings, until Team Seven was announced.

"Team seven, will be Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura, and Yamanaka Ino. Team Eight, Hyuuga Hinata, Aburame Shino, and Uzumaki Naruto. There is already a Team Nine, so we'll skip them, and Team Ten will be Akimichi Chouji, Nara Shikamaru, and Inuzuka Kiba."

Haran and Hinata's eyebrows rose when the teams were announced. After the results of the test, they had expected to be teamed up with Shino, while Kiba would go with Sasuke and Sakura. They had also counted on a reformation of the legendary Ino-Shika-Cho trio. Not that they weren't happy with their arrangement, but the pairings were too arranged to be solely based off of grades. The must be another reason that the teams were made as they were. The newly minted genin were given an hour for lunch before they were supposed to meet with their Jounin instructors. The twins followed Shino outside after asking the quiet boy if he wanted to have lunch with them. He was a bit taken by the proximity that the two shared, but brushed it off, coming to the conclusion that Hinata must have told Naruto her feelings.

Lunch was a quiet affair, as no one felt particularly inclined to break the peaceful calm that the three seemed to share. When they finished, the new Team Eight was the first to return to the classroom to meet their new instructor. Iruka was no longer there, but had posted a list on the wall, indicating which instructor was assigned to which team. Team Eight was assigned to one Yuhi Kurenai a newly appointed jounin who specialized in genjutsu.

The reasons for the team assignments became clear to Haran as soon as he saw who was the instructor for Team Seven. Hatake Kakashi was renown throughout the shinobi world as the legendary copy ninja, due to an implanted Sharingan after he lost his own left eye during a mission in the Third Shinobi war.

'So that's it, each team isn't just assigned an instructor by tenure or by choice. Each jounin is paired with a team so that their skills will compliment each other. We are a team of taijutsu specialists, and genjutsu specialists are notoriously weak in taijutsu. We are supposed to help Kurenai sensei with her taijutsu, while she helps us become shinobi.' Haran realized. 'Makes sense why Sasuke got two fan girls. Kakashi is supposed to be one of the strongest jounin in the village, so he would be best to train Sasuke and make sure his two teammates don't die.

As Haran continued to muse about his team placement, Kurenai entered the room to collect her team. Without saying a word, the three new ninja followed their sensei to a small clearing in the small woods right next to the academy.

"Well, how about we introduce ourselves?" Kurenai asked. "I'll go first so you can get a feel of what I want you guys to know about each other. My name is Yuhi Kurenai; I am a new jounin and a genjutsu specialist. My hobbies…I don't have too many, I like to hang out in my spare time with my friends; I do like karaoke and singing. I dislike perverts, perverted books and any thing perverted! I like my friends and my sensei, may he rest in peace. My dream for the future is to help you guys become the best shinobi you can."

Taking the initiative, Haran decided to go first, but under the guise of Naruto.

"My name is Uzumaki Naruto, my likes are ramen and training, I dislike the three minute wait for ramen to cook as well and people who judge others prematurely." He then slipped a bit of his true personality into this introduction. "I also dislike a certain governing body in this village. My hobbies…I don't know…eating ramen? Yeah, I'd say that's my favorite hobby! My dream for the future is to become Hokage and fix some problems in this town!" He finished with a flourish of happiness.

"My name is Hyuuga Hinata…I like to read…and tend to the gardens in the Hyuuga estate…I also dislike people who judge others without knowing them…I dislike my clan council for their role in degrading the members of the branch family." Her eyes became particularly steely when she said that, showing how serious she was about that statement. "My dream for the future is to become the clan head when my father is unable and change my clan from self destructing."

Kurenai was a bit surprised by her two student's admission of outright dislike for some of the governing in the town. Politics was an area that few shinobi got themselves entangled in, especially at their age.

'I wonder though, which body does Naruto dislike?'

Her musing was cut short by Shino, who had decided to give his own introduction.

"My name is Aburame Shino…I like insects…I dislike those who would harm an insect unnecessarily…I have no hobbies, and I have no specific dream for the future." His introduction was by far the shortest.

"Well, now that the introductions are out of the way, we can begin the real genin exam." Kurenai. Her hope that she would receive a little bit of a reaction was slaughtered when not a single one of her charges seemed unnerved by the news. "All right then, follow me." She grumbled.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Team Eight was lead on a winding walk through town towards the red light district, until they stopped at a small karaoke bar.

"All right, if you weren't aware, this team is to become a reconnaissance and intelligence gathering unit. Therefore, your test will be a test of those skills. I've signed you three up to perform a song, and while you are on stage, you must pay attention to the crowd and find the clue that I have hidden in the room. If you cannot tell me the three clues by the end of your three songs, you will fail and go back to the academy. We'll do this reverse alphabetically, so Naruto you're going first." She informed her team as she led them inside. The only reaction she got from her team was a look of loathing from Naruto, Hinata looked scared, and Shino was emitting a weak buzzing noise.

'Note to self, never make an Aburame sing karaoke again.' Kurenai joked to herself.

The four ninja entered the building and Naruto was shoved up towards the small stage in a corner. Looking through the booklet of songs available to sing, he cursed the day he was assigned Kurenai, and vowed to get her back for making him sing. Finally making his selection he stepped up to the podium and took a couple deep breaths to calm himself down and activate his byakugan, scanning for anything that seemed out of the ordinary. A henge was able to mask the 'veins' of his chakra pathways expanding, soon his song began to play.

_**Take, take, take, all my time, all my company**_

_**Take everything from me**_

_**Fake, fake, fake all these things that you say to me**_

_**Nothing that I want to believe**_

_**I think the time has come to set it straight**_

_**I need to change this frequency**_

_**'Cause everyone just says the same old thing to me**_

_**Get up!**_

_**Get up!**_

_**You're shattered crown, it drags me down**_

_**'Cause there's no sun when you're around**_

_**Your righteous lies, you slip and slide**_

_**Now I want you to just**_

_**(Fade out)**_

_**Static in my stereo man**_

_**(Fade out)**_

_**A new transmission's calling, here we go!**_

_**Say, say, say anything that you want to me**_

_**I'm still not gonna agree**_

_**I'm not gonna be a part, be a part of this**_

_**I'm not what you want me to be.**_

_**Because I need some time to set this straight**_

_**I'm gonna forward everything I say**_

_**Tell everyone to say the same old thing to me.**_

_**Get up!**_

_**You're shattered crown, it drags me down**_

_**'Cause there's no sun when you're around**_

_**Your righteous lies, you slip and slide**_

_**Now I want you to just**_

_**(Fade out)**_

_**Static in my stereo man**_

_**(Fade out)**_

_**A new transmission's calling...**_

_**A new transmission's calling, here we go!**_

_**Woah... A new transmission**_

_**Woah... A new transmission**_

_**You're shattered crown, it drags me down**_

**_'cause there's no sun when you're around_**

_**Your righteous lies, you slip and slide**_

_**Now I want you to just**_

_**(Fade out)**_

_**Static in my stereo man**_

_**(Fade out)**_

_**A new transmission's calling...**_

_**Change the channel, flick the switches**_

_**A new transmission's calling**_

**_A new transmission's calling, here we go_**!

Throughout his performance, Haran had been scanning the room, trying to spot anything out of the ordinary. About midway through the song, he spotted what he decided was a clue and made a mental note of it. When he finished, he quickly walked off stage, before Hinata could make more fun of his choice of song. One of his favorite phrases to describe the Hyuuga clan was 'broken crown'. The clan was once the most powerful in Konoha, but lately had begun to cut its own legs off at the knees with the branch family seal. The fact that the song clearly expressed his desire for a revolution in the clan was also a plus.

Next up was Hinata, who didn't have a clue what she would sing, but thankfully she didn't have to worry about finding a clue while she did so. She had been looking around the store with her byakugan as well, and had spotted the object she would present for her evidence. Deciding on a song she shyly stepped up on stage.

This time it wasn't even an act, she was very self conscious when it came to singing, the only people who had ever had the pleasure of hearing her voice was her immediate family, minus Neji. As her song began she couldn't help but smile as she realized that this song would do almost the same thing as her brothers, express her wishes through the lyrics.

_**Love love love love love love**_

_**You were everything I wanted**_

_**You were everything a girl could be**_

_**Then you left me brokenhearted**_

_**Now you don't mean a thing to me**_

_**All I wanted was your**_

_**Love love love love love love**_

_**Hate is a strong word**_

**_But I really, really, really don't like you_**

_**Now that it's over**_

_**I don't even know what I liked about you**_

_**Brought you around and you just brought me down**_

_**Hate is a strong word**_

_**But I really, really, really don't like you**_

_**I really don't like you**_

_**Thought that everything was perfect (perfect)**_

_**Isn't that how it's supposed to be?**_

_**Thought you thought that I was worth it**_

_**Now I think a little differently**_

_**All I wanted was your**_

_**Love love love love love love**_

_**Hate is a strong word**_

**_But I really, really, really don't like you_**

_**Now that it's over**_

_**I don't even know what I liked about you**_

_**Brought you around and you just brought me down**_

_**Hate is a strong word**_

_**But I really, really, really don't like you**_

_**I really don't like you**_

_**Now that it's over you can't hurt me**_

_**Now that it's over you can't bring me down**_

_**Oh oh oh oh oh oh**_

_**Oh oh oh oh oh oh**_

_**All I wanted was your**_

_**Love love love love love love**_

_**(Hate) Hate is a strong word**_

_**But I really, really, really don't like you (I really don't like you)**_

_**Now that it's over**_

_**I don't even know what I liked about you (liked about you)**_

_**Brought you around and you just brought me down**_

_**(Hate) Hate is a strong word**_

_**But I really, really, really don't like you**_

_**(Oh oh oh oh oh oh)**_

_**I really don't like you**_

_**(Oh oh oh oh oh oh)**_

_**I really don't like you**_

_**(Oh oh oh oh oh oh)**_

_**I really don't like you**_

_**(Oh oh oh oh oh oh)**_

While it wasn't as perfect as her brother's choice, Hinata was happy with her pick, the chorus expressed her sentiments toward the council of her own clan, as well as how she was treated by them. She quickly left the stage to the applause of her brother and sensei. She had a nice voice, but was too shy to use it.

Just like Hinata, Shino had gathered his clue before he had to go on stage, which was good, because he would probably just look for the clue instead of singing, and if Naruto had to sing, than so did Shino. He made his selection the quickest out of the three genin and took the stage.

_**Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.**_

_**Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.**_

_**Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.**_

_**And all the girlies say I'm pretty fly**_

_**For a white guy.**_

_**Uno, dos, tres, cuatro, cinco, cinco, seis.**_

_**You know it's kind of hard**_

_**Just to get along today.**_

_**Our subject isn't cool,**_

_**But he fakes it anyway.**_

_**He may not have a clue;**_

_**And he may not have style.**_

_**But everything he lacks**_

_**Well he makes up in denial.**_

_**So don't debate, a player straight**_

_**You know he really doesn't get it anyway.**_

_**He's gonna play the field, and keep it real.**_

_**For you no way, for you no way.**_

_**So if you don't rate, just overcompensate.**_

_**At least you'll know you can always go on Ricki Lake.**_

_**The world needs wannabe's.**_

_**So (Hey! Hey!) do that brand new thing.**_

_**Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.**_

_**Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.**_

_**Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.**_

_**And all the girlies say I'm pretty fly**_

_**For a white guy.**_

_**He needs some cool tunes**_

_**Not just any will suffice.**_

_**But they didn't have Ice Cube**_

_**So he bought Vanilla Ice.**_

_**Now cruising in his Pinto, he sees homies as he pass.**_

_**But if he looks twice**_

_**They're gonna kick his lily ass.**_

_**So don't debate, a player straight**_

_**You know he really doesn't get it anyway.**_

_**He's gonna play the field, and keep it real.**_

_**For you no way, for you no way.**_

_**So if you don't rate, just overcompensate.**_

_**At least you'll know you can always go on Ricki Lake.**_

_**The world loves wannabe's.**_

_**So (Hey! Hey!) do that brand new thing**_

_**Now he's getting a tattoo.**_

_**Yeah he's gettin' ink done.**_

_**He asked for a '13', but they drew a '31'.**_

_**Friends say he's trying too hard**_

_**And he's not quite hip.**_

_**But in his own mind**_

_**He's the, he's the dopest trip.**_

_**Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.**_

_**Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.**_

**_Give it to me baby. Uh-huh. Uh-huh._**

_**Uno, dos, tres, cuatro, cinco, cinco, seis.**_

_**So don't debate, a player straight**_

_**You know he really doesn't get it anyway.**_

_**He's gonna play the field, and keep it real.**_

_**For you no way, for you no way.**_

_**So if you don't rate, just overcompensate.**_

_**At least you'll know you can always go on Ricki Lake.**_

_**The world needs wannabe's.**_

_**Oh the world loves wannabe's.**_

_**So let's get some more wannabe's.**_

_**And (Hey! Hey!) do that brand new thing.**_

Shino had simply picked this song because it had the word 'Fly' in the title. This was one of the many reasons that Aburame's had never been a big fan of karaoke…or singing…they were tone deaf and had the bad luck of picking songs based on poor criteria. As he exited the stage, the remaining members of his team gave him polite applause, but were vowing never to make the stoic boy sing again. They were laughing so hard on the inside that they had probably punctured some organ.

"W-well, were you able to find the clues?" Kurenai asked, having to stifle a round of laughter, and only barely succeeding.

"The owner has four keys on his key ring, assuming that he has one for his home, this building, and one for the alcohol refrigerator, he has too many keys." Naruto supplied.

"There are pictures on the walls of every genin team to pass their exams, and they are all in groups of three, which means that they need to work together to be successful." Hinata explained her find.

"I believe you chose this particular bar, not because it is the closest to our meeting location, but because it has that jar over there." Shino pointed to a jar standing on a shelf behind the bar. "That is used for counting the number of successful missions the graduating gennin of the year completed before a new class graduates."

"Since you gave us three clues, we realized that the clues weren't random, they had to be used together." Hinata explained.

"Which makes the answer to your test, 'the key to success is teamwork.'" Naruto finished, shocking the jounin. She hadn't expected her team to be so thorough in their report of their findings. A smile crept onto her face.

"Congratulations Team Eight, as of right now, you are gennin of the Leaf!"

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Ok, so I realize that it might be kind of cheesy, but I wanted to put some songs in here…mainly because I could. The first song is 'New Transmission' by Lostprophets, the second one is Hate (I Really Don't Like You) by Plain White T's, and the last one was, obviously, Pretty Fly for a White Guy, by The Offspring. I'd suggest listening to them but it's just a suggestion. **

**Anyway, I hope you liked this chapter, so please review!)**


	5. Chapter 5

After dismissing Team Eight, Kurenai made her way towards the Hokage tower to report the results of her test and to officially announce her team as genin. She had noticed Naruto use a simple illusion over his eyes, but she couldn't understand why he would do something like that. Even for a mistress of illusions, such as herself, the slight transformation he had employed was enough to block whatever it was from her sight.

She had become so entrenched in her thoughts about her student that she arrived at the Hokage's office without realizing it. As she walked in, she noticed that Sarutobi Asuma, the Hokage's son was already there and from the looks of his mostly smoked cigarette, had been for some time.

"Team Eight has passed, Hokage-sama." She said, since she had never had a genin team before, she didn't know what else to say besides that. The old man smiled at her and nodded his head, before pushing some paper work towards her and indicating that it had to be filled out to make it official. As she began to sign the various forms, Asuma asked the question that both men had been wondering.

"So, what kind of test did you give them?"

"Since they are to be a reconnaissance team, I made them gather information while under pressure. They all passed admirably, and as it turns out Hinata has an absolutely beautiful voice." She replied offhandedly, concentrating on her work.

"Wait a minute, you made them sing?" Asuma raised an eyebrow at the young jounin.

"Yup, it was pretty funny, but they passed with flying colors." She replied out of habit once more.

"You're telling me" Asuma asked, obviously in a state of shock, "that you were able to convince an Aburame to sing?"

Kurenai just nodded her head remembering Shino's performance and nearly burst out laughing at the mental image.

"What…how…which song?" He stammered, still not believing the tale

"It was pretty easy, since it was a part of the test, and to answer your question it was 'Pretty Fly for a White Guy.'" She answered, and fell to the floor in laughter, no longer to keep it inside.

The image of the quietest boy in the graduating class, singing at all was funny, let alone a song as...unique as that one caused both men to clutch their sides in laughter.

That was the scene that Hatake Kakashi saw when he entered the Hokage's office. He didn't really have a reason to be there, since his test wasn't until tomorrow, but he did want to check on the other groups.

"What did I miss?" He asked innocently enough, despite having Icha Icha Paradise, volume three out and open.

"K-Kurenai got- Aburame Shino to- to-sn-sing!" Asuma was able to get out in between laughs the image not leaving his mind once.

This elicited a small chortle from the masked jounin, but upon Asuma whispering the song to him, Kakashi too burst into uncontrollable laughter, although he was able to curb his after a minute, while the others weren't able to for at least another five. Once the laughter was out of the way, Kakashi proceeded with his intended line of questions.

"So, what are your teams like? Mines alright, Sasuke's got an ego the size of the Hokage monument, but he was the rookie of the year. Hokage-sama, please don't tell me I was like that when I graduated the academy!" Kakashi pleaded with the grey haired leader. Upon learning that he wasn't like that Kakashi continued with his team. "Sakura is too obsessed with Sasuke and boys in general to concentrate, and I'm honestly surprised that she wasn't assigned to Kurenai. She would make a good genjutsu specialist with her chakra control. Ino's…interesting. She's nothing like her report stated, she's very sly and intelligent. I also question why I was assigned her instead of Ibiki or Anko."

"Sadly, your team was made by Homura and Koharu, I think they are a bit too infatuated with the boy and are trying to se him up to create more Uchiha quickly." Sarutobi confirmed that Team Seven was nothing more than a puppet to the village council.

"My team in fine, Chouji is actually really strong for someone of his, er, stature. Kiba is actually pretty dang fast when he uses that **Shikyaku no Jutsu** (Four legs technique) of his. Shikamaru, well he's rather interesting. He has got to be the laziest person I have ever met, and I'm including myself in that assessment, but he seems to be extraordinarily bright. He came up with a strategy today, just to avoid some of the Uchiha's fan girls. Lazy as hell, but the plan was well though out and well above what most genin can do. It was like he was able to predict the ways they would move and adjust accordingly. Something is off about the kid, and I plan on finding out what." Asuma sounded rather pleased with his team and everyone could tell.

All eyes turned towards Kurenai, who had just finished her paperwork and handed it to the Hokage before she began.

"Shino is as quiet as many of you were told, but his mind is rather sharp and he has keen eyes, plus those kikai of his are useful for intelligence gathering too. Hinata isn't as shy as she was made to be, she actually wants to enter politics when she gets older. Said she was going to change the clan and stop them from cutting their nose to spite their face. Naruto…he's weird too. Also wants to go into politics, as Hokage that wasn't too surprising, but he flat out said that he hates, and I quote "a certain governing body in this village". His eyes are just as good as Hinata and Shino, which is surprising, considering he doesn't have a bloodline like those two. His mind is a bit sharper than Hinata's, but just below Shino's and he, just like Shikamaru, is a big mystery."

"Well, I assume you all have more important things to do than hang around with an old man, such as myself, so I suggest the three of you take your leave for the night. I will see the two of you tomorrow for mission assignments." The Hokage ordered the jounins out of his office, while instructing Asuma and Kurenai to report for missions. Kakahsi and Asuma left, but Kurenai remained behind. There was something she had to know.

"Hokage-sama, during my test, I noticed that Naruto was using an illusion to cover his eyes, could you tell me what is going on?" She half asked and half demanded. Sarutobi was prepared for this question, before he had even graduated; Haran had set this contingency plan up with the Hokage.

"I cannot tell you; however, if you head to Training area forty-four, I'm sure you could find your answers." He answered cryptically.

Kurenai nodded, but was confused as to why she had to go into Anko's playground, just to find out about her student.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Upon arriving, she didn't see anything that was out of place, and realized that she would have to enter to find her answers. It would be a pain in the neck to traipse around the entire forest, so she hoped that she got lucky and ran into her student.

After about an hour and a half of searching, she was loosing her patience with this game of hide and send Kurenai on a wild goose chase. It was at that point that she heard the sound of fighting coming from her right. She headed over to the sound, hoping that it was her student. She did find her student, but the wrong one. Hyuuga Hinata was sparing with a boy her age that had the same hair color as her, but was definitely not Naruto.

"So you spoke with the Hokage." The voice of Hyuuga Hiashi brought her crashing back to reality. Without looking the man in the eye, something she hadn't be able to do since the death of her jounin sensei, Hyuuga Hizashi, she answered.

"Hai, Hyuuga-_sama_, I was looking for Uzumaki Naruto, but found your daughter instead." Kurenai seethed every time she had to refer to the man with any form of respect. The man had sacrificed his own brother for his own life.

"Perhaps Hinata would know; it is about time for her to finish training anyways." He speculated before dropping down to the ground.

"Hinata, I believe your instructor is looking for you teammate, perhaps you could help her." He suggested while holding back a smile. Meanwhile he walked over and began talking with his son.

Hinata made her way towards her sensei, hoping that her brother's plan would go smoothly. If it did, the look on her sensei's face would be priceless.

"Hinata, what are you doing out here, and who were you sparing with, I've never seen him before." She asked.

"That's my brother, Haran, it's a long story, but because of the threat of the caged bird seal, Otousan hid him away and so we have to practice here, that way no one will see Nii-san." She explained, without a trace of a stutter, and only slight panting.

Kurenai was floored by the information; Hinata's twin brother was alive and hidden away from the council by his heartless father…maybe she had been wrong about Hiashi.

'No! He sacrificed Sensei; I can't forgive him, just because he saved his son. I bet if Hinata had been born second, he wouldn't have done the same thing!' She thought, before regrouping.

"Hinata, have you seen Naruto, I need to ask him some questions."

"Sorry, I haven't seen 'Naruto' since I've been here." The Hyuuga heiress replied, not lying at all.

"Ok, well, I guess I need to keep looking then." She monologued. As she was about to leave, Haran walked past and shattered her world.

"See you tomorrow Nee-chan, Tou-san, oh, and you too sensei." Kurenai nearly fainted at the statement.

"N-naruto?"

"Well, I prefer my true name, Haran, but yes, you would know me by that name." He quipped.

Kurenai actually fell to the ground in shock at the situation. The near dead last of the academy was actually a Hyuuga, and not just some run of the mill Hyuuga, but the only son of the Head of the family.

"So this entire time you've been, what, acting?" She asked, dumbfounded.

"Pretty much, in school I had to act like an idiot, but now that I'm on a team, I've decided to drop the mask. I just wanted to see the look on your face when you found out." He laughed at the shocked look on his sensei's face. After she had sufficiently recovered, she discussed Haran's true personality with him, and before she left, she had his word that he would tell Shino when the team met tomorrow.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Shino's reaction the next day was nearly as funny as Kurenai's. He had arrived at the meeting spot that Kurenai had designated, only to find Hinata and an unknown Hyuuga were already there. They were sparing in what seemed to be a high class jyuken battle, with the unknown ninja winning. In an attempt to scope out this new person, Shino had one of his kikaichu gather information about the mystery kid. The dark grey insect returned quickly after leaving, relaying that the new kid was 'Uzumaki Naruto' based on scent and chakra signature.

Haran and Hinata stopped sparing and went to sit with Shino while they killed the final five minutes of their wait. The pair sat down to his left, with Haran sitting directly next to him.

"How are things, Shino?" The boy asked.

"I am fine, I was just wondering about your appearance, Naruto." The silent boy was intrigued by the new look.

"Actually, my name is Hyuuga Haran, and Hinata is my twin sister. I never was Uzumaki Naruto, I just need to act like an idiot so the clan council can't find me and place their stupid seal on me." He explained. By the time Kurenai arrived, Shino had been told the basic story of Haran's life, including the Kyuubi. (After all, they were a team, so what good would keeping secrets be?) Shino understood about being typecast because of something living inside your body, so he took the news better than Haran had expected.

Kurenai appeared in a puff of smoke, and looked at her team. Shino seemed rocked by the news, but over all he took it in stride and accepted that Haran had come clean and that a true team could now form between the three of them.

"Well team, we have our first mission today, we're going to…"

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Well, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, I tried to address the many people that pointed out that Kurenai should have noticed the illusion Haran used last chapter. You can insert whatever lame D-rank mission you want at the end there, I'm not going to write it out. Next chapter, I do believe I might just skip a head to a c-rank mission, although it won't be the wave mission. Thanks for the wonderful reviews; I can't get enough, their like Pringles! **

**I would like to pose a question to you, what type of chakra nature should Haran have? Choices are:**

**1) Wind, obviously this is cannon, but I will tell you now, any wind natured jyuken moves he would learn will be nearly identical to what I have planned out for Hinata in my other story, so you'll already know what he would be able to do.**

**2) Lightning, It's just kind of cool to imagine a Kaiten filled with electricity, right?**

**3) Earth, It's so rare for him to have earth nature that it would be interesting to do.**

**Anyway, vote in a review please and I'll put a tally up in the next chapter. If you are submitting an anonymous vote, please leave some kind of email so that I can make sure the numbers for the vote are correct. That's all I'm asking, is that too much? Anyways, until next time, please review!)**


	6. Chapter 6

Team Eight stood in front of the Hokage, awaiting their next mission assignment. All three were seething that they had to walk dogs and retrieve cats. These were jobs that should be given to academy students! They had very little practical experience in intelligence gathering yet, and were beginning to wonder if they would ever get a decent mission.

"Alright, Team eight, your next mission will be to…clean up the river! Team seven did it yesterday, so I figured we could give them a break." Iruka smiled as he assigned his favorite team their next mission. He could see the anger boil behind their eyes. (Except for Shino, damn sunglasses.)

'Almost there, just a little more…' He thought and internally grinned.

'NO WAY! I've had it with these stupid missions!" Hinata yelled at her former sensei.

"Now now, these are the missions that all genin have to do before they can be given higher ranking missions." The Hokage spoke up. This was a complete lie. D-rank missions were used for more than just earning money. They were designed to be as miserable as possible to force the genin to question orders. While a ninja is supposed to obey orders, they must think for themselves and never obey an order that they know to be wrong. This was another test to see if they could be trusted with the higher ranking missions that chuunin and jounin took.

"Forget that! We are supposed to be a reconnaissance squad, but we've not done a bit of data gathering! We need a better mission if we're to become useful to the village!" 'Naruto' argued. While everyone present in the room knew he wasn't the loudmouth blonde, he had to keep the appearance up.

Shino nodded his head while Kurenai was silently proud of her team for passing this important test.

"Well I suppose that is true. We do need to give them some field experience." The Hokage agreed and reached for a C-rank mission.

"This is a C-Class mission, meaning that you should only encounter bandits and the chances of that happening are minimal. This mission is to do an appraisal of the economy in the villages surrounding the Fire Country. A businessman by the name of Gato has been using force to expand his territory and I have little doubt that sometime in the near future we will receive a mission that will directly interfere with him. What we need to know is to what extent the economy of our neighboring villages might be damaged, should he be killed. The removal of the head of an organization will cause panic and we need to know, to the best of your abilities, is how his subordinates will react to his death. You have a time limit of a month to complete this mission, and I expect updates weekly, if not more often. Take the rest of the morning to prepare and leave by sundown tonight. You are dismissed." Tossing the scroll to Kurenai, the Hokage smiled and resumed his paperwork.

Team eight split apart to gather their supplies and Haran accompanied his sister as far as he could safely before heading towards his apartment. He packed some emergency rations and a basic first aid kit, as well as some changes of clothes. He was finally able to put the clothes his father had purchased for him to good use. The new outfit consisted of dark brown shorts that had an assortment of pockets for holding supplies, as well as the loops and snaps for kunai holster and utility pouch. He had a number of tee-shirts he took; most of them were lighter in color and much less vibrant than his standard orange affair, mostly white and grey. He had a number of black long sleeve tee-shirts that he wore under the white or grey shirt, and had a light jacket not unlike his sister's, but no where near as thick. It was the same color, but had hard padding and weights built into the fabric instead of the warmer coat Hinata wore. He changed into a pair of the cargo shorts and a black long sleeve shirt with white stripes going down the arms. The Hyuuga emblem was noticeably absent on all his clothing, but the jacket did have the spiral that is present on all chuunin and jounin vests.

He still had a bit of time before he had to meet his team, so he headed towards the Yamanka flower shop to arrange for a fresh delivery of flowers for his mother. He used a henge and adopted the façade he used when patronizing many different shops.

Ino's mother recognized him immediately and smiled at the boy who grinned back and looked around the store, though he had it memorized. It was kind of a tradition, he would enter and then spend about ten or fifteen minutes walking around looking at the various arrangements of flowers before buying one pot of white bleeding hearts to take to his mother.

Sure enough, ten and a half minutes later, Haran walked over to the counter with the aforementioned flowers in hand.

"It's been a while since you've come in to buy your flowers instead of having them delivered, hasn't it, Haran-kun?" The elder Yamanaka asked.

"Hai, although I do miss looking at the arrangements, they always look so nice." He responded. "I've been meaning to ask, how was your daughter's genin exam? I haven't heard about it from anyone."

"Oh, it went as well as could be expected when your third teammate is obsessed with the other one. From what I heard, they passed pretty much on dumb luck, Sakura tried to tackle Sasuke, who leapt out of the way and Sakura ended up accidentally kissing Hatake Kakashi through that mask of his. That gave Ino and Sasuke enough time to make a dash for the bells."

Haran chuckled at the thought and paid for his purchase. As he was about to leave, he remembered a question he had been meaning to ask.

"Yamanaka-san, would it be possible to arrange for a new pot of flowers for the next three weeks? My team and I are going on a mission and I won't be here to deliver a new pot."

"Of course, that's not a problem at all." The blonde replied happily as Haran returned to pay.

After taking care of that he made his way to his Mother's room for one last good-bye before he left for a month. He met up with his team and enjoyed the reaction of Kurenai to his new look. He wasn't able to drop the henge until they were far enough away from the village to ensure he wouldn't be found out. By the time they set up camp, Uzumaki Naruto had disappeared, only to be replaced by Haran.

They made it to the first town on their list in short order and completed their objective easily. That was the pattern for almost every town and village they went to, save a few. Every once and a while they would encounter some of Gato's thugs, but they only had to fight once, most of the time their presence was enough to scare their opponents away. Shino would place kikai bugs on any agents of the shipping mogul that they found and would retrieve any information about movements into the fire country. Hinata and Haran would use their byakugan to keep an eye out for anyone suspicious when they were in a town, as well as to watch suspects from far away as both were proficient lip readers.

The state of affairs was pretty good, should Gato be killed or die. His hold hadn't reached too far into the fire nation and what little he held could easily be suppressed. What worried the team were his holdings in territories farther away. His main 'force' was concentrated around the shipping lanes in Wave and some over land routes around Suna, however, due to his penchant for hiring missing ninja, this might prove dangerous if he died and the ninja decided to take their pay directly from the surrounding area. Kurenai's reports to the Hokage stated as much and she knew that the old leader would take this to heart before assigning any assassination missions.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

While Team eight was off gallivanting, Konoha remained mostly unchanged. Mostly because, Team Ten had finally requested a C-rank mission and were given the task of clearing out a small camp of bandits from a town up north, which they were able to complete in two days.

Team seven was not a lucky, with Sasuke too involved in himself to care, and Sakura too far absorbed to listen. Ino had become annoyed with the 'missions' they had been assigned and tried lobbying to get a better mission, only to be rejected by Sakura and Kakashi. He knew that his team wasn't displaying the teamwork needed to survive harder missions. So she was stuck doing lame missions and then working for her Mom. The one semi-bright spot that she had found was that she was to deliver the flowers that Haran had ordered to the Hospital every week. Instead of dropping the flowers off and returning to the shop like she was supposed to, Ino decided to drop off the flowers and then sneak into the room that they were supposed to be delivered to. She quietly snuck towards the room where Hyuuga Sora lay in slumber, and was about to enter, when Ino heard noises from down the hallway. Quickly hiding herself in an adjoining room, she watched as a nurse entered with the flowers she had just delivered.

'Of course!' Ino berated herself 'I forgot about the flowers, I really should have thought this out more.'

The click of the door shutting snapped the blonde out of her stupor and she made her way across the hall, making sure that no nurses or doctors would interfere. Slowly, the door inched its way open and Ino slipped inside, taking equal care that not a sound be made as the door shut itself. Turning around, she got her first look at the mother of the boy she had fallen for.

'She's beautiful.' Ino lamented as she took in the features of her subject. The dark hair of Haran was obviously from his mother, as well as body size, Sora wasn't exactly tall, although Ino didn't know how much of that was atrophy and how much was genetics. Just as she was about to move closer, she heard a noise from the hallway. Thinking it was the nurse; Ino hid behind the door and was relieved to hear the noise pass her. Deciding not to press her luck Ino left, never seeing the name of the women she had been spying on.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

While Ino was poking her nose where it aught not be, Team eight was plodding along, making excellent time on their mission to scout out Gato's claims in the Land of Fire. For a C-rank mission it had been down right boring, not action. No one minded really, they were beginning to grow disillusioned with the mission, and doubled their effort to finish it soon.

It had been a long two weeks, but they were only one village away from completing their task, and then they could return home. Once more the initial scan went smoothly enough, but as the day progressed, Hinata noticed that an abnormally large number of people were gathering on the road ahead of them.

"Sensei, I think that Gato may have set up a going away party." She alerted the older women. Kurenai nodded, so they were going to get a bit of action after all.

The group wasn't too much of a threat, except for the fact that there had to be fifty of them! The initial plan to deal with groups like this was to have Shino's kikaichu leech of the chakra of the group, hopefully taking a majority of them out. Then Kurenai would cast a wide area illusion and they would just be able to slip away. The plan worked nearly perfectly, a few of the bandits had some shinobi training and were able to cancel the illusion, but they were quickly dispatched by the Hyuuga twins, their jyuken made quick work of the bandits.

For good measure, they searched the bodies of the unconscious people for any kind of information that would help them ascertain Gato's plans. They lucked out. A poster for a bounty on a bridge builder named Tazuna was found on nearly every body. It made sense, if a bridge was built connecting Wave to solid land, they couldn't be held hostage by blockades and embargos anymore. Kurenai sent this notice, along with her report and notice that Team Eight would be returning home, to the Sandaime as dusk began to fall.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Well, I know it wasn't exactly action packed or terribly long, but I didn't really see them wasting time on bandits that couldn't pose a threat if they wanted to. Thanks for all the great reviews I got for the last chapter, I hope you like this one. **

**Poll standings:**

**Wind: 10**

**Lighting: 18**

**Earth: 3**

**Fire: 3**

**Water: 4**

**Please vote! Although if you've already voted, please refrain from doing so again, I will be checking! _A special thanks goes out to Firefly25 for inspiring this chapter, although I did take your idea and run with it. I hope you like it!_** **Please keep reviewing, and I'll keep writing.)**


	7. Chapter 7

"But Hokage-sama, they aren't ready, even their sensei agrees!" Iruka argued with the more experienced ninja.

"I know Iruka, but it is a requirement for genin teams to complete a c-rank mission before they are able to participate in the chuunin exams, and my colleagues wish for Team Seven to be eligible when the exam comes to Konoha." Sarutobi explained the rational behind assigning team seven a c-rank mission.

Iruka was frustrated and there was nothing he could do about it. The councilors to the Hokage, Homura and Koharu, had requested that Uchiha Sasuke, and by default team seven, be eligible for the exam that was to be in about a month. Iruka was against this idea for a number of reasons, first off was the lack of teamwork, the famous Hatake Kakashi had admitted that they only passed his test by sheer luck and that their teamwork hadn't grown like the elders had insisted. Secondly was the reasoning behind their decision, exposure. They wanted to be able to flaunt the last Uchiha in front of the various foreign ninja and daimyos that would come for the exam finals. This could easily back fire, especially with the Hyuuga twins and their cousin, Neji. Neji was the previous rookie of the year, before Sasuke, and Haran was reportedly a stronger fighter than his cousin. For all Iruka knew, Sasuke might fail in the first round, thus negating their opportunity to show him off. It was a flawed plan and he couldn't do anything about it.

He sighed in defeat as team seven walked in and awaited their first c-rank mission. The Hokage explained how their mission was to guard a bridge builder named Tazuna until the bridge he was building was done. The grey haired man knew that this was far beyond a normal c-rank mission, since it would almost assuredly involve an assassination, if not an encounter with missing ninja, but he had a back up plan in place, and besides, Kakashi would be there, and there weren't many who could stand up to him. After introducing their client, the four members left to gather their supplies.

Sarutobi sunk into his chair, he didn't want to send those four out, he wasn't sure that they could work together to protect their client, which is why he had called for team eight.

Kurenai entered, followed by Hinata who was placing a scroll into her utility pouch and then Haran and Shino, who were having a small conversation about the usefulness of termites.

It had only been three days since they had returned from their first C-rank mission, so Kurenai was wondering what was happening, normally teams that were on missions for longer than two weeks got at least five days off before their next mission, something wasn't right.

"Unfortunately my advisors decided that it would be a good idea to assign team seven to guard Tazuna. Kakashi should be able to handle any threats, but I'm afraid of the teams reaction should they face missing ninja. Although you don't have any combat experience yourselves, I feel as though your team would be an ideal ghost detail for team seven." Sarutobi explained. He received a look of surprise from Kurenai, but not from the genin. Of course, Shino was as stoic as usual, but Haran looked anxious and Hinata looked indifferent.

"You're asking us to tail team seven, and make sure that they don't die?" Kurenai asked, skeptically.

"Unofficially yes, officially, your mission is to ascertain Gato's hold in the wave country, something you were not able to do in great detail on your previous mission. We need to know if we would need to commit forces to settle any uprisings, or if an independent Wave would side with us or one of our more hostile allies. This should be a good test of your skills in both combat and data gathering, so this is more of a high C-class or low B-rank mission, but if you can complete your mission without alerting Kakashi I'll give you a bonus more akin to an A-rank." His last statement was met with a chuckle from the team who accepted the mission and went on their way to collect their supplies.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Team seven had left around noon, so Team eight left about ten minutes later, keeping enough distance to be able to help in an emergency but stay hidden. How? Thanks to the twins byakugan! By having Haran scan ahead of Kakashi's team, they knew what they would be coming to five minutes ahead of Kakashi, giving them five minutes to try and catch up to Team seven. Hinata kept her eyes trained on the team watching for any sign they had been found. It had been an uneventful hour so far, but that changed when Haran spoke up.

"Sensei, there's a genjutsu up ahead that is no better than low chuunin level. I can't see through it, but it seems to cover two people from the size of the area." He reported.

After contemplating for a moment, Kurenai made the decision to close their range to half the current distance, but they should remain hidden.

As Hinata watch team seven pass by the genjutsu, she watched as Kakashi used kawarimi to avoid the now identifiable two assailants. She watched as Sakura froze as she watched her sensei disappear and the entire team heard her scream. She saw Sasuke pin the chain that the two heavily armored shinobi had attached to their arms, to the tree. Ino proceeded to use her family's **shintenshin no jutsu** (Mind Body switch technique) to take control of one of the two shinobi and then used the confusion to disable the other.

Not wanting to make a noise so close to the group, Hinata motioned that everything was ok and the ghost team dropped back. Once they were at a safe following distance, Hinata spoke up.

"It seems that the cat is out of the bag so to speak, Ino-san was able to disable one of the ninja after Uchiha-san pinned their chain to a tree. She worked well considering that there was no plan in place for this situation. We'll just have to see if they continue on."

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Of course, team seven did indeed continue their mission, Sasuke was upset that he didn't get to fight more and Sakura was annoyed that Ino had taken out both shinobi, especially considering that Kakashi had told them they were chuunin level.

Team eight was having a much easier time of things than team seven. Shino had attached a female kikai bug to each member of the team, as well as Tazuna, so that should they somehow give the ghost team the slip, they would be located easily enough. They were able to get a bit of extra sleep that night, although during Haran's guard shift, he noticed a bit of movement at the edge of his range, something that could spell trouble for them tomorrow.

They awoke the next day early enough to clean up their site and not leave traces, and still shadow Team seven without sacrificing time. Haran had told them of the movement he had seen the previous night, and Kurenai agreed that it might be another assassin out for the bounty on Tazuna. Sure enough, not more than fifteen minutes into the day, Haran spotted two figures with significantly larger chakra signatures than the two chuunin they saw yesterday. Since they were not using a genjutsu, just stealth, he theorized that they were at least jounin skill in terms of stealth. One had the mask of a Hunter ninja, while the other was recognizable to anyone who had read the bingo book. Momochi Zabuza was an A-class missing nin, wanted for the attempted assassination of the Mizukage and was a former member of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist.

"Kurenai-sensei, there are two jounin level ninja, one is Momochi Zabuza, but I don't recognize the other, but he is wearing a mask like a hunter ninja. It's obviously a ruse, they wouldn't be working together if they were enemies, but we need to catch up quickly, they are just about to pass in front of them." Haran spat out the information with a sense of urgency.

Kurenai's blood red eyes widened and she motioned for her team to close the gap again, but still remain out of sight. Since the opponents were jounin, she had them close to three-quarters distance, instead of one-half, like the previous scare. Sure enough, Zabuza had made his presence known, and Kakashi had revealed his sharingan before the team was within visual range, but the second ninja was just hiding in a tree, not moving. He seemed to be observing the proceedings with great interest. Haran assumed that the faux hunter nin was trying to figure out a way to negate the sharingan, but couldn't be sure. If it was true, that meant that Zabuza's plan wasn't to win this fight, but to test Kakashi, and then come back and finish his assignment, which meant that his assistant was needed to spirit him away at some point. Haran pointed out the location of the assistant to Kurenai, who formed the seals for one of her favorite illusions, **Magen: Jubaku Satsu** (Demonic Illusion: Tree Bind Death) and disappeared.

In a tree overlooking the battle, a boy with long brown hair watched as his father figure fought with the famous Copy Ninja, Hatake Kakashi and his sharingan eye. The first semblances of a plan began to form in the teen's head as he watched the copy wheel eye mimic the mizu bunshin through the thick fog of the Kirigakure no jutsu. He never noticed the slight rise in chakra until he found himself under the illusion that Kurenai so expertly wove. He felt as though he was melting into the tree he was crouched on and lost all motor control of his limbs. His head jerked up as he watched Kurenai materialize out of the tree, kunai in hand. He could do nothing as she slid the sharp knife through his windpipe, bringing his tragic life to an end.

Making sure that the body wouldn't fall out of the tree, Kurenai made her way back to her team. She wasn't a combat specialist like Kakashi, and had a difficult time seeing through the mist that Zabuza had created. The twins reported that Kakashi had been captured by Zabuza in a water prison and his team was having no luck freeing him. It should have been a simple matter, Ino could have just taken control of his body, but Sasuke had rushed head first into a battle with a mizu bunshin and was being man handled, forcing the blonde to focus her attention on the clone, in an attempt to free her teammate.

Kurenai decided to step in and ordered Shino and Haran to help out the other genin, while Hinata was to stay back and keep look out over the area. Haran was forced to henge into his 'Naruto form' or else ruin his secret. Shino simply released swarms of kikai to leach off the chakra in the air, thanks to the hidden mist technique, as well as deplete the chakra of the mizu bunshin. Both tasks were handled with swift efficiency, as Team seven was shocked when the fog was cleared by the sound of buzzing, and Uzumaki Naruto stood next to the injured Sasuke.

Seeing the new arrivals, Zabuza became worried, if mere genin had slipped past Haku, than the boy was either captured or dead. He felt the subtle manipulations in chakra around him that indicated a genjutsu was being used. He canceled the illusion before it could even affect him, but in reality it was too late. Kurenai had cast a multi layered illusion, the first was easily recognizable, but the second was much more difficult to notice. It was a simple illusion, one that made the victim think that they were somewhere else, other than their true location. To free Kakashi, Kurenai made the former swordsman think that he was on dry land and that Kurenai had tripped him up. He instinctively placed his hands out to break his fall, but in the process he broke the hold he had on his water prison. Kakashi, who was able to see through both of the illusions, rose to the surface, ready to finish his fight. When his hands went through the 'ground' Zabuza realized his mistake. He needed to take his chance to escape, since Haku wasn't there to save him.

He needed to salvage this situation somehow. Suddenly, the thought of the sixth genin stuck in his mind, if he could find that genin, he would have a large bargaining chip to be played at a later date. He quickly located the genin, a girl, who was in a tree a good distance away, but it was worth a shot. Creating a bunch of water clones, he erupted from the water towards the other genin, only to be blocked off by both jounin who had relocated themselves to intercept his movements. They were both shocked to find that they were fighting one of the clones and quickly dispatched of the liquid form, before moving on the next one, only to find the same thing. The real ninja had already covered the distance to Hinata's location, but before he could grab her, a puff of smoke interrupted his view, as a boy with blonde hair and blue eyes appeared in his way. Zabuza quickly dispatched the clone with a swing of his sword, but that was all Hinata needed to get away from the man. She used his outstretched sword as a branch and leapt off and away from the bandaged man. Cursing, he called out more mist before disappearing into it once more. Shino's kikai quickly went to work on removing the mist but when they did, the missing nin was gone and everyone was accounted for.

Kakashi was glad that Kurenai and her team had shown up when they did, it was his fault he had been caught in the water against someone from Mist, not one of his brightest moves. He was going to question why they were sent, when he felt the initial twinges of fatigue and pain that signified chakra exhaustion. He covered his sharingan before falling to the ground, unconscious.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

After checking over the collapsed jounin, Kurenai took command and had her team help move Kakashi and Sasuke to Tazuna's house, which was close by. She introduced herself to Tazuna and his family, before taking her team to a room and planning their scouting routine and schedule. With Zabuza not gravely injured and loose, they would need to be very careful and not go out on their own. It would have to be done during the day, and Kurenai would need to be in the area with them. It put a new hindrance in the path of their investigation, but Team eight took it in stride and set about helping Team seven heal their wounds and caught back up with one another.

Haran had taken this time to dye his hair, instead of relying on a transformation, as well as insert blue tinted contacts. It would not be good for Kakashi or any member of Team seven to notice him.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Now before you go and tell me that the Byakugan can see through genjutsu I HAVE NEVER SEEN ONE INSTANCE WHERE IT HAS BEEN STATED THAT THE BYAKUGAN CAN SEE THROUGH GENJUTSU! Check wikipedia, check narutofan, they both have detailed descriptions of different bloodline limits, and neither mentions the byakugan being able to see through genjutsu. I will contend that they can see the chakra that is being woven, but cannot see through it, like the sharingan. Also please don't hate me for killing Haku so early; I didn't see a realistic way to keep him alive with two byakugans and another jounin there. I would like to thank everyone that has reviewed this story, your opinions are always welcome and I enjoy your reviews. **

**Poll Results (One round left, please don't vote twice!)**

**Wind: 12**

**Lighting: 29**

**Earth: 4**

**Fire: 5**

**Water: 6**

**The reason that I'm only have one more chapter left to vote is that Haran will begin nature manipulation much earlier than in the manga. Please vote and review!)**


	8. Chapter 8

Team eight stayed with Team seven while Kakashi was recovering from his bout with chakra exhaustion. He was unconscious for the first day and a half that the teams were in wave, so team seven didn't have much to do. Team eight was working on their original mission, with less than heart lifting results. Wave was in a lot of danger from the missing ninja and various employees of Gato, should he be killed or removed. With the morale of the town in the dumps, things would go poorly if they were invaded. All of this was obtained in the first day, which only spoke to the condition of the village. If some foreigners could waltz in and get such information, than the town had little to live for.

Kakashi, once he regained consciousness, picked up his questioning where he left off. Kurenai was guarding Tazuna, since her team wasn't out and were currently helping Tazuna's daughter, Tsuname, around the house.

"Kurenai-san, what was your team doing out here, didn't you just complete your first c-rank mission a couple days ago?" The lazy and still slightly dazed jounin asked his opposite number.

"Due to the bounty put out on Tazuna, we were ordered to investigate the status of the Wave to see how they would react to the sudden change in power, should he die. It's pretty bad; they're nearly broken, both economically and spiritually."

Kakashi seemed to be in deep thought at her statement. "Hmm, so because my team isn't ready for a c-rank, Sandaime-sama sent your team as a ghost to make sure we survive this." He correctly deduced. He was a master of seeing 'underneath the underneath', after all.

Kurenai wasn't surprised at his discovery and just nodded.

"Any idea as to when Zabuza will come back?" The pepper haired man inquired. He would be out for about two weeks himself, and if the demon of the mist returned, than things would be bad.

"None, but I took out his help, so he'll have to come up with a counter for your sharingan all by himself. He wasn't much better off than you in terms of chakra; I believe Hinata managed to seal off the tenketsu in his sword arm, so he'll be one armed for a while." It was true, when Hinata had leapt onto Zabuza's sword to escape; she had streamed some of her own chakra down the blade into his arm, disabling it. "He's going to come back, and he'll have someone else with him, he's not stupid enough to take on two jounin by himself. I'd expect at least another ninja, but I don't want to guess at any more that he might bring." Kurenai was expecting at least another jounin, if not two or a jounin and a pair of chuunin.

"Is your team up to shinobi confrontation?"

"Yeah, we're ready. I'm worried about your team. I heard what happened with Sasuke, is he really dumb enough to rush into a fight by his self?" She inquired.

Kakashi sighed. Sasuke was a definite problem. It was because of the lone boy of his team that he had to be rescued by team eight. Sasuke's refusal to work with his team had held Ino back from forcing the enemy jounin to release him.

"Yeah, I know, we're going to have to train them for the inevitable now, so I guess we'll have to do a team building exercises."

"My team is fine in that department, so you'll be on your own; we still have a mission to complete." Kurenai corrected the more experienced man. "We might be around to train with you, but that would be about it until Zabuza returns and if he has brought friends with him."

Kakashi nodded, knowing that there would be no changing Kurenai's mind.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Sasuke had recovered fine, he had more of a broken pride than a broken bone, but to him it was as if his life was over. If he couldn't beat this chump, than how could he kill his brother? Not even his favorite sport of insulting Naruto could cheer him up. The blond had grown much more than the avenger, something that was noted with great disdain by the dark boy. While Sasuke was delving deeper into depression, Ino was greatly annoyed at her teammate. If Sasuke hadn't jumped the gun, she could've easily gotten Kakashi out of his predicament, but it just couldn't be that easy, could it? She was mostly hanging out with Sakura and Hinata, when the girl was around, doing various chores around the house, which was surprisingly large for the number of occupants it sheltered. The boys of team eight, were quiet, a rare feat for Naruto, but they helped out as much as the girls, so she didn't mind the blonde's curious attitude.

In honesty, she was jealous of Hinata, she was on a team that could actually work together, as evidenced by their actions against that missing ninja. While Sakura wasn't drooling over Sasuke she was still infatuated enough to try and tell Hinata the story of how **_he_** defeated the Demon brothers, despite Hinata's protests that she already knew. It wasn't good for the team if one of the members would subjugate themselves to another one, that wasn't the exact opposite of what should be accomplished. Not for the first time, she wished she had been placed on a team with Shikamaru and Chouji, like her father had wanted. A new generation of the Ino-Shika-Chou team would have been nice to work with, although the expectations might have been a bit high, she wouldn't have to put up with an arrogant teammate and a chronically late sensei.

She returned to her work, while visions of a boy named Haran drifted in and out of her head, never realizing that the object of her affection was within 100 feet of her at any moment.

Sakura was a bit angry with team eight, to tell the truth. They had butted into their first true mission as ninja, when there wasn't any need to. So what if Kakashi had been caught, and Sasuke was a bit banged up, they could still take any enemy, right? As much as she tried to say yes, a voice in the back of her head said that she, along with her team, would be dead if it wasn't for the timely arrival of their comrades.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

The next day, team eight was gone soon after dawn, so they could get an early jump on their mission, as their first report was due today, and they wanted to have a good amount of information to send back. They couldn't get in the heart of the city, incase Zabuza or another one of Gato's hired ninja were out in force, but the twins were able to use they range to note the different living conditions throughout the country, while Shino used his insects to do much the same thing, but he also used some to mark any suspicious people, mostly just people who were much better off than the others, or those who were 'visiting'.

Kurenai was writing out their findings as they were reported in, and after translating them into the standard code used for sensitive information, she sealed the scroll up and summoned a messenger falcon to return the data. They returned to Tazuna's house just in time to catch team seven leaving for some training.

Deciding that they should at least attempt to work together, Kurenai decided to volunteer her team to participate in the team building exercises. The tree-climbing exercise was one of the first things Kurenai had attempted to teach her team, keyword being attempted. All three had already completed the exercise, and in the case of Hinata and Haran, they had also completed the water-walking exercise. Suffice it to say that these three had a great deal of fun watching team seven try and climb the trees while tied together with rope.

Seeing how pointless it would be to wait for them to finish, team eight left to do their own training, mostly involving taijutsu, but also Kurenai introduced a new subject, chakra nature and its manipulation. She explained that everyone's chakra had its own 'nature' or type that it would make it easier for each person to learn a certain type of elemental techniques. She explained that nature manipulation was a jounin level skill, and couldn't even be attempted before the individual had an understanding of raw chakra manipulation. The jyuken was an example of raw manipulation. When a jyuken strike lands, the chakra wasn't formed by any hand seals, and wasn't intended to become something else, like the elemental techniques. To some extent, Shino's control over his kikaichu was raw chakra manipulation, although not on the same level as the Hyuuga's.

"Take one of these and channel a bit of chakra into it. This is a special type of paper; it is made from trees that have been raised with a lot of chakra. If your paper splits in half, for example, you have wind nature chakra. Go ahead and see what happens, and I'll explain which nature you have when your done." Kurenai handed out the small square slips of paper and waited for the show to start.

Hinata's paper crinkled halfway down the paper from the top, but once it reached the midway point, it turned wet from there down. Shino's paper simply turned to dust after he applied his chakra to it, while Haran's did almost the exact same thing as Hinata's, except where hers turned wet, his split in half. He ended up with two different pieces of paper.

"Well, Hinata, it seems that you have two chakra natures, as do you, Haran, this isn't uncommon, as most jounin have multiple natures, but for someone your age to have two different natures is rare. Your main element, since it is on top, is lightning, same for you Haran, but Hinata, your secondary nature is water, while yours is wind. Shino, your nature is earth. Now that's not to say that you don't have another type, but it will take a lot of work to be able to perform nature manipulation with them."

She then put them to work, trying to learn how to perform simple techniques without hand seals, the easiest step in raw chakra manipulation. Although this in itself isn't raw chakra, by learning to do techniques without hand seals, it helps later.

After one day, team eight had made about as much headway on their task, as team seven had with combined tree walking, not too much. They made their way back to Tazuna's house to get some dinner and rest, because tomorrow, team seven would return to guard duty, well Sakura and/or Ino would, they could both do the tree-climbing exercise individually, just not tied together. Team eight would continue their mission and training regimen. Unfortunately, this period of clam wouldn't last.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Sarutobi unrolled the scroll he had received from team eight, just a few minutes ago. The news wasn't good. Not only was Gato's influence strong, in terms of economic influence, but he had infiltrated the government, so in essence, the current government would be a puppet that he could control from afar, once Wave had been brought to it's knees. There were a number of people who seemed to be on the take from the greedy business man, and they all seemed to hold powerful positions in the town. If Gato was removed, his lackeys would almost assuredly move on the town, who were two weak to fend off the assault and would collapse, creating a haven for criminals that would just happen to be the major shipping lane between Kiri and the rest of the shinobi nations.

There wasn't much he could do, should Gato die. If he sent troops into wave to quash the criminals, that would break one of the old treaties with Kiri, but he couldn't allow Gato to cut off the shipping lanes. He had to hope that teams seven and eight would be able to protect themselves, and the village.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

While these events were taking place, Momochi Zabuza was recovering from his injuries at a much faster rate than Kurenai or Kakashi suspected. His arm, although numbed, had regained feeling and motion after a day, and his chakra supply slowly began to refill. The loss of Haku was a deep one, the boy always was a better tactician than the jounin, and his experience would be missed here for sure. One thing was certain; Zabuza needed help something he didn't like to admit to anyone. While he couldn't go and request a genin team to help him, he did have some friends that would help him.

Tomorrow he would begin his search for a former comrade of his, and with any luck, by the end of the week, sharingan Kakashi would be dead.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Well, there you have it, the results of the poll were pretty lopsided, lightning received 41 votes, wind only got 18. I know my chapter is rather short, but I wanted to make the fight longer, so I moved it to the next chapter. I hope you can wait until next weekend for that. Thank you to everyone who reviewed, I enjoy your opinions very much, as well as the stroking you give my ego. Please review and I'll promise to keep up the (hopefully) high quality work.)**


	9. Chapter 9

A week had passed since the combined forces of teams seven and eight arrived in Wave, and to say that the attempts at team training for team seven were an unmitigated disaster would have been nice. Ino and Sakura individually were able to climb trees using their chakra, but Sasuke was straggling behind. When they the three were tied together at the waist and told to climb as one, they failed horribly, Sasuke's inability to regulate his chakra would cause the boy to fall after only a handful of steps, pulling his teammates with him. After their seventeenth fall from the low boughs of a tall oak, Sasuke got fed up with this training and demanded that Kakashi teach them something useful, or set up a sparing match against team eight.

"All they're doing is walking around town, they should be training!" He would argue, only for Kakashi to giggle perversely and ignore his pleas.

I suppose that it was this lack of communication between student and teacher that lead to Sasuke trying to pick a fight with 'Naruto'.

"Dobe, I see you're off doing your weak little mission instead of training. There's no way you'll be able to beat me if you don't train more."

Normally this would have provoked the blond into action, but Haran had spent a long time working on his chakra nature manipulation, and hadn't gotten very far, something he wasn't too used to. So he ignored the comment from the Uchiha and continued to walk back to Tsunami's house with his teammates.

This struck some kind of nerve with Sasuke; no one ignored him and got away with it. Except Kakashi every time he demanded some kind of alternative training, so there was one person who had ignored him, but after today, only half of the people who ignored him will have gotten away with it. Deciding to make the dobe pay attention, Sasuke charged Naruto's unprotected back. As he neared his target he was immediately stopped by a mass of Kikaichu that he plowed through without giving them any thought. On the other side of the wall of insects was Hinata who proceeded to close as many tenketsu as she could reach, which was a lot, and left the Uchiha on his stomach with no chakra left to continue his training. Haran had just kept walking; he hadn't even turned his back.

Kakashi saw the entire confrontation and rubbed his temples. There was no way that he would even consider nominating his team for the chuunin exams, Sasuke was too much of a lone wolf and there was no teamwork to be had at all. If it weren't for Sakura and Ino, who had improved greatly since he had take them under his wing, he would have disbanded his team when they returned, the village council be damned. Jumping down from his perch in a near-by tree, Kakashi walked over to Sasuke's limp body and checked to make sure he was alive. Hearing the boy groan in fatigue, the jounin sighed and called for Ino and Sakura to stop their training for the time being. No point in doing team training if one of your teammates is incapacitated. He picked Sasuke up and slung him across his shoulder, like a sack of potatoes and headed towards their lodgings also.

"Kakashi-sensei, shouldn't you speak to Kurenai about punishing Naruto? He did provoke Sasuke into attacking him." Sakura ventured in an attempt to defend her crush.

Ino just looked at her friend and wondered if they were watching the same thing. Either Sakura needed to get her eyes checked, or she needed to get off whatever hallucinogenic drug she was on.

"No, Sakura, Sasuke brought this upon himself and he needs to deal with the consequences. If anyone should be punished it's him for attacking a fellow Konoha shinobi." Kakashi replied, wondering why he had passed this team again.

This shut Sakura up for a moment, but she would come back louder and more annoying than ever before, he was sure of it.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Things didn't get better for the remainder of their week. Every time Sasuke would even glimpse Naruto, he would try and attack the dobe to prove that he was stronger than the boy, only to be dealt with by Shino and Hinata before he even reached the blond. After the second day, team eight had decided to take an alternative route back to Tsunami's house, as to avoid the insane in the membrane Uchiha.

Haran was having little improvement over his chakra nature abilities, and was getting angry at himself over it. It's not like Hinata or Shino were having any better luck, but what little pride he had as a Hyuuga was beginning to rear its ugly head. As night fell, he decided to head back with his team before it got too dark. There was no point in staying out all night to work on a jounin level skill that wouldn't even be needed for this mission.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

The next day Team eight left early to get a jump on their espionage mission, and it was a good thing too. As they were passing the still unfinished bridge, a thick unnatural fog began to roll into the area. Immediately the team closed in together to better protect themselves.

There was no warning of the attack other than the hiss of Zabuza's sword as it was swung toward the team, which was ducked easily enough. The hard part was the follow up from an equally large sword that was wrapped in bandages.

Shino set his kikaichu to work clearing up the fog, a task that was quickly accomplished, revealing Zabuza and his accomplice, Hoshigaki Kisame. The later was dressed in full length black pants and a sea green shirt, which covered his arms completely. He had blue skin and resembled a shark, from the row of sharp teeth in his mouth, to the gills which adorned his cheeks. The amount of chakra that the new comer was releasing was insanely large, causing the Konoha shinobi to become wary of this opponent. Haran formed a shadow clone and had it run back to Kakashi, only for the clone be destroyed by a blast of water, courtesy of the new guy.

'Damn! He's fast!' Haran thought as he tried to come up with a new strategy. Settling on a method of general chaos, he created a multitude of shadow clones and once more sent them scattering towards Kakashi for help. Once more these were washed away by a wave.

"It's no fun if you go running for help kid." Kisame joked.

"And it's no fun if you have your chakra." Haran replied, causing Kisame's eye brow to rise up a bit. The idiot kids had some plan.

Team eight watched as Shino's kikai suddenly swarmed Kisame, only for the body to fall into a puddle of water.

"Shit!" Haran muttered as his byakugan registered Kisame attacking from their rear. The genin were forced to separate from their sensei as Zabuza took the opportunity to separate the team. From here on out it would be three genin against one of the most infamous ninja that Mist had ever produced.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Kakashi woke up upon feeling the spike in chakra that accompanies a battle and was quickly running to catch up with team eight. He was waylaid by the appearance of an army of thugs, accompanied by Gato himself.

'Damn, team eight is in way over their heads and I get stuck here.' He thought as he started to take out men left and right. He was quickly aided by his team; Sasuke leapt into the fray a bit quickly, but thanks to his use of fire jutsu, was able to hold off the much larger force. Ino was using her family's **shintenshin** to wreak havoc among the rag tag group, as seemingly random men were suddenly set upon by their own neighbor. Sakura took up a guard post with Tsunami and their family.

Kakashi knew he had to save his energy for when he made it to the bridge, but he needed to get their quickly, else team eight be slaughtered. Deciding that he could use one large scale attack and still be in good shape to help out, he quickly flew into a large sequence of hand seals.

The water that surrounded the battle ground began to churn and bubble until it exploded over the land and swept the vast majority of the combatants away, leaving only a handful of guards and Gato himself. Knowing what could happen if he killed the fat business man, Kakashi was hesitant to kill him, but he realized that if he didn't finish the man than he wouldn't stop until he had control over the village. Liberating a katana from a fallen soldier, Kakashi made quick work of the remaining goons and the fat leader soon followed. Team seven was ecstatic that their mission was made many times easier, but didn't notice the look of worry that took its place on their sensei's face. They did notice when he suddenly ran off towards the bridge. Not knowing what to do, they hung around the house and made sure that no further attacks were made against the family of their client.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Kurenai was worried about her team. There was no way that they could survive against the shark man, he was rated an S-class missing ninja, comparable to Uchiha Itachi, for his deeds which involved murdering daimyos and anyone foolish enough to get in his path.

She had her own problems though, as Zabuza had made a complete recovery since their last encounter, and had no motivation to run away this time. Kurenai was forced to continuously dodge that accursed sword of his. He was fast considering how large that oversized knife was, and if Kurenai hadn't been working to correct her flaw in taijutsu, she would have had a very difficult time in keeping away from his wild swings. At times, she thought she saw some kikaichu crawling over the bandage faced ninja, but they were few and would be rather ineffective in draining chakra. It was alright though; Shino would need all the help he could get.

Zabuza's specialty in silent killing made his ability to locate targets without his senses strong enough to the point where he was immune to many illusions, making Kurenai's job even harder.

The genin weren't faring any better than their sensei, even though it was apparent that Kisame was taking it easy on them. Shino's bugs couldn't get in close enough to leech his chakra away, and his sword kept either of the twins from getting too close. They had made one interesting observation. The sword had the ability to eat chakra, just like Shino's kikai. This came at the expense of a Kaiten performed by Haran. The sword initially stopped, but slowly it bit through until it forced the boy to duck underneath the blade, so as not to have his head removed.

The three actually had a plan, the problem was implementing it. Kisame was stronger, faster and had more experience than all three put together. He claimed he was smarter, though no one believed him. But for the time, all they could do was dodge and try to counter attack, and both actions were near impossible to pull off.

Kurenai was finally able to cast a genjutsu that would affect the 'demon of the mist', but it didn't leave her a lot of time to attack. Quickly rushing in with a kunai in her left hand, she was able to land what should have been a fatal blow to the nukenin's neck, but as soon as the edge pressed against his skin, he broke free of the illusion and managed to escape her attack at the last second. (For those BLEACH fans, think of Zaraki Kenpachi's fight against Tosen during the Soul Society arc)

Having lost her chance at the kill, Kurenai was pleasantly surprised when she saw a pack of dogs erupt from the still unfinished bridge and bite into Zabuza. This was followed quickly by Kakashi rushing in to finish what Kurenai started. This time Zabuza was able to shake free of the **Doton: Tsuiga no Jutsu** (Earth type: Tracking Fang Technique) only after Kakashi had administered a fatal kunai slice to the man's jugular vein. Zabuza collapsed and began to bleed to death on the bridge.

Turning their attention to the genin, they were astounded to find that the three had Kisame on the ropes. When Kakashi had appeared, Kisame had been taken by surprise and took his eyes off of the genin for a crucial second. The twins had taken advantage of his lapse in concentration and both delivered their own **Hakke Rokujūyon Shō** to the blue man's sword.

Seeing as the sword Samehada can eat chakra, it must have a chakra circulatory system to store and process that chakra. The twin's had been able to see the system and attacked it, disrupting the system and actually fracturing the blade by the end of their attack.

This was the scene that Kakashi and Kurenai found when they turned their attention to their charges, a sword less Kisame facing off against three of the most promising ninja in Konoha. Even without his weapon, Kisame was too fast for the genin to hit, but not for a lack of trying. Kakashi decided to stop the fight before any more damage could be done; all of the combatants had sustained injuries, shave wounds from the shark like skin of Samehada, as well as bruises from other attacks.

The copy ninja focused a lot of chakra into the palm of his hand until it became visible and began to make a screeching noise that sounded like a multitude of birds chirping. Rushing at the blue man and thrusting the newly formed **Raikiri** (Lightning blade) through the missing ninja's head, all parties involved were shocked to see 'Kisame' turn into one of the corrupt men from the village.

"What was that?" Haran asked, hoping that Kakashi didn't see the combined jyuken offensive.

"It appears to be some kind of sacrificial technique that allows someone to make a puppet of themselves." Kakashi stated after checking the body and making sure it wasn't just a puppet in the traditional sense.

As team eight began to stumble back towards their temporary house, the real Kisame was reporting on his fight.

"The jinchurriki is…different. He knows the jyuken, but does not seem to posses the byakugan. It is something that should be taken into account when we are hunting him."

The eyes of the leader narrowed in thought as he dismissed the shark man with a wave of his hand.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Team eight was welcomed back by just about everyone, with the exception of Sasuke, and had their wounds treated. They weren't serious, but they were numerous.

"Kakashi-sensei, what happened? Why did you run off like that?" Ino asked, as she looked over the state of the other team.

"Zabuza and an acquaintance of his made an appearance at the bridge and I had to help out. An A-class missing ninja is hard enough, but when you throw in an S-class one as well…things get complicated really fast."

Upon hearing that team eight got to fight an even tougher opponent than Zabuza, Sasuke became mildly angry and gritted his teeth together before Sakura asked the question on everyone's mind.

"How did you guys manage to beat such strong opponents?"

In an unusual display of vocalization, Shino was the one to reply.

"We struck down evil with the mighty sword of teamwork and the hammer of not bickering."

Team seven looked at the boy like he had grown three extra heads, while Haran and Hinata just fell to the ground in laughter at the quiet boys jab at the other team."

Of course, Sasuke didn't take to this too well and stormed out of the room in a funk that is said to still float around the countryside to this day, causing pandemonium amongst the rabbits.

After a few days of rest, Team eight headed back to Konoha, their mission was complete, and due to the extra time they spent around town, they were able to secure a profitable alliance between Wave and Konoha.

As the gates of Konoha came into view, every member of the team considered the mission a complete success, not only had they brokered a trade deal, they had stopped the fat cat and helped the people gain control of their lives once more.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Hey! Sorry for those of you who were waiting for this last weekend, I just got so wrapped up in my other story (all 17 pages of it) I didn't have the time or energy to put into this last week. So here it is, the conclusion of the Wave arc, I hope you liked it, and I hope at least some of you get the vague movie and book references I made. (BTW if anyone can tell me where I got the pandemonium amongst the rabbit's line I'll send you a preview of the chuunin exams) ** **Until next I write I look forward to your reviews, and I thank everyone who has previously reviewed!)**


	10. Chapter 10

Team eight took the week before team seven returned easy. Well, it wasn't easy for most teams, but it was easy for them. Haran and Hinata had driven themselves into the ground in an attempt to gain control over their chakra nature. The concept required much more concentration than any other technique that they had been taught, and not surprisingly, it was beginning to annoy the younger of the two. He hadn't been able to show anything that could be considered control over lightning, his primary element, or wind, his secondary element. Every time that he would fail, he would have to take some time off and attack an innocent tree.

Hinata had shown a bit more control, but for the most part, the technique eluded both of them. Where Hinata had shown more potential, was her water element. When she was standing on top of the water she could feel some kind of control over the liquid, but not enough to be considered dangerous, or even proficient.

Neither twin had seen much of their third teammate, but they knew that Shino was probably doing something with his clan. The Aburame clan was extremely formal, though not as rigid as the Hyuuga. Kurenai was currently meeting with the Hokage, along with almost every other ninja above the rank of genin.

"As you are well aware, the Chuunin selection exam is being held here, starting Wednesday. We have a number of younger teams that have the opportunity to be nominated for the exam, but it is up to the discretion of their senseis. I will open the floor to nominations at this time." The Hokage was addressing the nearly three hundred ninja that had assembled in the woods.

"Yosh! I, Maito Gai, nominate my team, Hyuuga Neji, Rock Lee, and Tenten, for the upcoming exam." Gai was a tall man, with thick black hair that he had sculpted into a 'fashionable' bowl cut. His most distinguishing features, however, were his trademark green spandex, as well as his overly large eyebrows. More than one person had compared them to very fat caterpillars, or even rug that had been hot glued on his head instead of the floor.

"Sarutobi Asuma nominates Team 10, Akimichi Chouji, Inuzuka Kiba, and Nara Shikamaru." Asuma had his usual cigarette between his teeth, and he let out a large puff of smoke after every name he listed off.

"Yuhi Kurenai and I'm nominating Aburame Shino, Hyuuga Ha-Hinata, and Uzumaki Naruto." Kurenai had become so accustomed to referring to her student by his true name that, she almost spoke his name, but was able to catch herself before it was obvious that she made a mistake. Of course, a few of the more alert ninja caught the hang up, and wondered what was going on with the young jounin.

Two of the three rookie teams had been nominated for the exam, all eyes not turned to Kakashi, who was reading his usual book.

"What?" The scarecrow asked without looking up. Many, many people sweat dropped, they had been expecting him to nominate his team.

"Well, are you nominating them or not?" An anonymous voice chimed out from the crowd.

"Hmm…" Kakashi took a long and dramatic pause, before returning his attention back to his book. "Nah, they aren't ready yet."

At this the Hokage sighed. He really didn't want to do what he must, but it was necessary.

"I'm afraid that for the first time in our history, I must allow team seven to participate, even though they do not have the endorsement of their jounin sensei."

This drew a look of shock from the majority of the gathered shinobi, and more than a few had broken out in cries of bewilderment.

"QUIET! I have no other recourse, due to the fascination that my former student, Orochimaru, has for the sharingan. Even though Sasuke hasn't awoken his blood limit yet, Orochimaru will stop at nothing to obtain Sasuke. By forcing his team to participate in the exam, I am gambling on the fact that the large number of ninja, from the genin participants, to the various instructors, will hopefully deter my student. If he were not entered in the tournament, than we would have no way to protect him without leaving a guard, something that Orochimaru would easily spot. Due to Kakashi's lack of endorsement, none of the team is eligible for promotion, but they shall undergo the tests, as far as they can. With any luck, they will make it as far as the second exam, and even if they fail there, we should be able to keep a security detail around Sasuke without raising his suspicions."

The chorus of voices slowly died down at the conclusion of the professors speech, no one being able to deny the facts laid before them, though many were skeptical that the security would be enough to deter the former sannin. With a wave of his arm, Sarutobi dismissed the assembled mass, and waited for the question that would undoubtedly come from the famed copy ninja.

"I understand that you are trying to guard the boy, Hokage-sama, but how can you assure my team's safety in the forest of death? It is too large to be surveyed by one person, or even a team of people, and you said yourself that a shadow team would be spotted by Orochimaru, I don't see how you could risk the lives of three genin so carelessly." The normally lazy jounin's voice was a bit weathered, sounding tired and haggard.

"This is not something that I would do under any other circumstance, but one of my other students has sent me word that Orochimaru has joined forces with Suna, and may make a move during the exam. As for how I plan on securing the safety of your team, I will amend the usual test to fit our needs. You needn't worry about this; I will be making the exams much harder, making the number of entrants moving on after the first round, much less than normal. You have said that Sasuke's ambition is too large for him to admit defeat, so the first test wouldn't be a problem for him anyway. This time, it will be much more difficult to pass. Hopefully it will limit the number of passing ninja enough so that we may safely control his movements." The Hokage also sounded tired, as if this was a decision he had lost much sleep over. Kakashi could only nod his head, before he disappeared in a puff of smoke.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Kurenai had called a meeting for her team, a meeting that she made sure they knew they could ill afford to miss. As usual, Hinata and Haran arrived together, with Shino not far behind. The only unusual thing was that the twins seemed to be arguing over something, but when they drew close enough, they stopped bickering.

"Well, I nominated you three for the chuunin exams that are coming up, to participate you need to fill out these forms, and turn them into room 331, inside the academy building, by noon Thursday, or you won't be allowed to enter." She stopped there purposefully, to see if her team would probe for more information as to the exam itself, or to the other participants.

"So who else is participating?" Haran was the one who spoke up first, true to the mask he would be once more forced to don.

"Maito Gai's team will be entering, he held them out of the exam a year, unlike you guys, so they will be more experienced than the rookie group, and as much as it creeps me out to say it, they are probably better trained than many, if not most of the entering ninja. Sarutobi Asuma nominated his team, and I nominated you guys obviously."

"But team seven wasn't nominated?" Hinata asked, trying to piece together a picture of the competition.

"Yes, but do to some _unusual_ circumstances, they will be participating." Kurenai filled in a blank for her team, once more testing their ability to gather data for their upcoming 'mission'.

For a moment, all was quiet as the three junior ninja thought over the information they had gathered. This was a training exercise that Kurenai had them practice over and over, trying to piece together a puzzle from sparse clues and words laced with propaganda and innuendo.

"Team seven is being allowed to participate for the same reasons that they were given the C-rank mission to wave country. The council is favoring Uchiha-san again, and forcing Kakashi to allow his team to enter, despite their lack of teamwork." Shino was the one who broke the silence, venturing his theory.

"Close, but not the entire truth, this time, the reason for their entry is far less self serving." Kurenai hoped to keep her team guessing as long as possible, something that was very difficult to do, with someone as sharp as Shino and the twins on her team.

"Well, the only other person with the authority to forcefully enter a team is the Hokage, if it's not the council, but why would Hokage-sama do something like that? It isn't for the exposure of the village…and I'd assume that he trusts Hatake-san, so it can't be to spite him. He's doing it to…show Sasuke how weak he really is?" Haran's answer was weaker than his explanation, but he just couldn't think of better at this time.

"Ooh, once again close, but not quite. It is Hokage-sama that ordered them be entered, but he has no agenda for 'teaching Sasuke how weak he is', as you so eloquently put it."

Hinata had a look of concentration on her face as she set her mind to work on this puzzle; it was much more difficult and elaborate than any they had been tested on before.

"Hokage-sama entered them…and if they are entered, they are going to be evaluated…no that not it. Without the approval of their sensei, none of the members can be promoted, so what's the point?"

The three once more went off into deep thought, before something clicked in Haran's head.

"If they can't be promoted, because their sensei doesn't have faith in their skills, than they obviously don't have the skills necessary to obtain the rank anyway, so the evaluation…it isn't an evaluation! He's watching the team by using the proctors in the exam! It's a close range shadow of team seven, under the guise of the exam! But I still can't figure out why Hokage-sama would risk their lives in the exam just to have some high level shinobi baby sit."

Kurenai smiled, they were almost there!

"If he needs high level ninja to 'baby sit', than whoever is supposed to be after team seven, must be a high level shinobi also." Shino put his two cents in.

"Orochimaru!" Hinata's voice became rather small when she uttered the snake sannin's name. "He's supposedly after the sharingan, so if Hokage-sama knew that he was going to make a move during the chuunin exam…he would move Sasuke into an environment where he could control and protect him, instead of leaving him alone!"

Kurenai just nodded. On the one hand, she was extremely proud of her team, they had been able to figure out the details of the situation that many fully grown shinobi had been unable to, but on the other hand, she was worried. It was an almost certainty that Orochimaru would use the chuunin exams to make his move, and her team was going to be in the middle of it.

"That's right." Kurenai smiled at her team, they deserved it, it was something that probably should have remained within the ranks of the higher up ninja, but she felt her team needed to know what they were getting into. "Now, I want you to understand a few things about this exam. First of all, people will die in the course of the test, this is unavoidable. Secondly, if Orochimaru really is going to make his move, than the chance that people will die goes up exponentially. He will kill anyone he can, just to get close enough to Sasuke-san, so avoid team seven as much as possible. Normally, the second part of the exam would be where the risk of death is greatest, but Hokage-sama is making some changes to the test this year, in an attempt to week out more people, so even if you are forced to quit early on, do not feel bad. Finally, if I find out that any of you died in the exam, I'll reanimate you and kill you myself!" The joke at the end had the desired result of snapping the team out of its deep thinking mode.

"Now I'm ordering you guys to take the next day easy! That goes doubly for you two, I know you want to learn chakra nature manipulation, but take a day off! Get packed well before hand, and arrive on time! I cannot say that enough, if you're late, no matter how much whining you do, they won't let you in! Have a good day off, and I'll see you all before you go in for the exam." Kurenai's words lessened the heavy mood a good deal, and Haran found it comical about how anal she was when it came to punctuality. They their teacher good bye, and headed off to do whatever they were doing before this meeting.

As she watched, Kurenai noticed that Haran and Hinata picked up their previous argument exactly where they left off. She laughed at how comfortable the two were around each other, despite the years they had spent apart. She would have to ask what they were arguing over later. As she left the area, she caught Hinata finally loose her cool and strike her brother in the stomach, resulting in the shadow clone being dispelled in a poof of smoke. Deciding that she really wanted to know what was going on now, Kurenai approached close enough to hear Hinata mumble:

"Stupid clone, why couldn't he teach me the stupid technique?" She was talking to herself now. "'You don't have enough chakra' Blah! I'll give his enough chakra; I'll give it to him right in the gut! I think he's just jealous because I got farther in nature manipulation than he has!" She walked off, muttering under her breath about upstart younger brothers who don't know when not to keep secrets from their older sisters.

For some reason, this settled Kurenai's nerves more than the talk she had given her team earlier. If they could take the information that had received, take it in stride and move on with their lives, than they were more than ready for the responsibilities of a chuunin.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: There's chapter 10! I promise that the next chapter will have the new and improved exams. What I really hope though, is that I explained my reasoning for having team seven in the exams, even though they obviously aren't ready for it. Trust me, they will factor in to the exam, but their role in the overall plot of it is kind of limited.**

**As you know by now, this is becoming rather abusive to Sasuke and Sakura, well mostly Sasuke. Anyway, I have a question to pose to you, my loyal readers. Which would be most embarrassing to Sasuke's ego?**

**1) Looses to Haran in the second exam?**

**2) Looses to Haran in the third exam?**

**3) Looses to Gaara in the third exam?**

**4) Looses to Gaara in the second round?**

**This isn't really a poll, I have the plot of the exams more or less mapped out, and I just wanted to see what you think on the issue. Personally, I think it would be 3, especially if Gaara took an arm and/or a leg, making his dream of killing Itachi impossible to obtain, but that's just me. I suppose it would be just as bad if he lost to Haran in the second round.**

**Thank you to everyone who has reviewed already, I appreciate your comments a lot, and I hope to hear from all of you for this chapter as well.)**


	11. Chapter 11

Thursday rolled around, and team eight headed towards room 331 in their old stomping grounds, the academy. Going into the chuunin exam, they knew a couple things. First off, was that the exam wasn't easy normally, and know it had to be set up so that Orochimaru couldn't get to Sasuke. This would make the exam much, much harder, for how does one trick a sannin, but allow genin to pass a test? All the information they had gathered on the old tests, often handed out as part of their training with Kurenai-senei, was now useless. The benefit of being a reconnaissance specialized squad, was that they had the ability to enter into a completely foreign situation, get information and then get out intact and healthy.

They had arrived well before the noon deadline, which allowed them to scope out the competition, as well as avoid any unofficial tests that were designed to delay teams from meeting the deadline. They watched from the corner of the waiting room as multiple teams from various countries walked through the doors. There were so many teams from Konoha that it seemed harder and harder as time passed, to find the foreign teams. Eventually they spotted a team from Amegakure, the Rain village, and then a team from Kusagakure. As the saying goes, when it rains it pours, and the team began to find new ninja at an increasingly quick pace. There was another two teams from Rain, plus at least three more from Grass. Suna, which was named after the desert sands that hid the bustling village, had sent just one team, which the three spies in training though weird, especially the birth that two of the members were giving the third.

This boy was a red head, and had dark black rings around his teal hued eyes. He just stood in the middle of his team, his arms crossed, never closing his eyes, just staring at the assembled ninja that were huddled about.

Hinata had been watching different targets of interest with her byakugan, making mental notes on what she found. Shino was doing much the same thing, but his notes were more focused on their words, as his kikaichu were better suited for the task than the twins were. Haran had been standing in front of his two teammates, screening interested eyes away from the two doing the spying, and onto himself. That was until Hinata tapped his back, the signal that she found someone or something very interesting.

Pushing just enough chakra to his eyes to activate his eyes, Haran's eyes fell upon the Sand team, and began to analyze the situation. The boy to the right of the formation was wearing a black jump suit and seemed to have cat ears sewn onto the hood that covered his hair completely. There was a suspicious bundle on his back that turned out to be a puppet of, what to Haran at least, was high quality.

The kunoichi to the left of the group had her hair in four small pig tails that spiked her hair back. She wore fairly standard garb for someone from Suna, meaning a loose, lightly colored kimono that seemed suited for battle. She had a large metal fan strapped to her back and eyes that were constantly sweeping over the competition.

"You're right, they're all wrong for this exam." He spoke softly, so as not to be overheard, but made sure that his sister's suspicions were confirmed. "The puppet user is way out of his element, not enough cover indoors, and the one place we know for sure that will be used, the arena, is almost as barren. As for the fan girl…wow I never thought I'd say that about someone and mean it in a nice way…anyway, the chances that we'll go into a heavily wooded area are pretty high, so she's out of her element as well. Too much cover for anyone she'd fight. Makes you wonder about the third one then, doesn't it?"

Turning his gaze back to the silent red head, Haran's gaze became more focused, trying to see into the very depths of the boy's soul. Upon a closer inspection, Haran found that the boy had golden colored chakra, where most people had blue. This was cause for concern, mostly because of his own experience in attempting to use the Kyuubi's chakra. He had little success, but according to Hinata, when he tried, there would be an influx of red chakra into his system from his navel. Haran hoped that he was just being paranoid, but he was beginning to suspect that one of his fellow competitors was a jinchuriki just like him. He let his feeling known to his teammates, with the explicit direction that they should avoid the Sand team if possible.

More and more teams began to walk into the room, until it was packed full of teams from all over the shinobi continent. Haran eyed one of the many teams from Konoha that were much older than his group. Either this test was extremely hard, or these ninja just didn't have the right stuff. There were only a few teams of interest; most of them were on the young side. It made sense because the more distant villages would only send their best teams, ones that had experience, but were young and quick. Out of the side of his vision, Haran noticed the other sponsored rookie team walk into the room. They were keeping mostly to themselves, but were slowly moving towards team eight.

"So you guys were nominated also? This is a pretty big crowd don't you think?" Chouji was the one to approach the much quieter team first.

"Yeah, well that just means more people for me to beat!" Haran had to delve into his Naruto mask, although he still hated doing so. He had hopes, rather high ones, that by the end of this chuunin exam he could come out of his shell and finally be with his family.

After a few minutes of talking and eying the crowds of ninja, there was a loud commotion as team seven entered the room. This was caused by Sakura who was up in arms that some 'weird kid in green beat up her Sasuke-kun'. An older Konoha genin with grey hair approached the shrieking girl and her team, in an effort to quiet them down. He pulled out a deck of cards, which seemed to catch the attention of the team. Hinata caught the eyes of her teammates and both nodded, before moving to see what was so interesting. Team ten, having nothing better to do, decided to follow them.

"-anyone you were interested in?" The older boy was asking about other people

"Yeah, Sabaku no Gaara, Rock Lee, Aburame Shino, Hyuuga Hinata and Uzumaki Naruto." Sasuke spoke up with an actual hint of interest in his voice.

"Oh, you have names that makes things easier, do you mind me asking why so many names though?"

The last three are teammates; they had a mission that interfered with ours a while back." This time it was Ino who supplied the answer to the question, but she had one more of her own. "Can you find people if I only know their first name?"

"I suppose, of course the more popular names might take a while to get through. Who did you want to know about?"

"His name's Haran, but I don't know his last name." She answered, a blush slightly marring her cheeks, which the grey haired kid noticed but didn't comment on. Sakura now grew interested upon hearing Ino ask about a boy.

Five cards which were already splayed over the floor were joined by one more, but they were all blank. Noticing the stares, the boy quickly explained that the cards were inscribed with his own chakra, so as to be readable by only him. With a slight touch, the information spread over the cards like ice over a pond.

"Sabaku no Gaara, he is the son of the current Kazekage and his teammates are his siblings. He hasn't done a single D-rank mission, but he's done a few C rank missions as well as a B and even an A rank mission. The amazing thing is that he hasn't been injured on these missions, not even a scratch!"

Sasuke nodded as if expecting such unusual information.

"Rock Lee, he's a year older than you guys, but has no ability to use ninjutsu or genjutsu, but his taijutsu is absolutely off the charts! He's probably more advanced than most chuunin because that's all he can use. His teammates are Hyuuga Neji, the previous year's top student, and Tenten." Once again, Sasuke looked nonplused.

"Aburame Shino, Hyuuga Hinata and Uzumaki Naruto…well, their squad is supposed to be a reconnaissance specialized squad, and they also seem to have a taijutsu heavy group, with an Aburame and a Hyuuga. Shino was the second ranked ninja in your class, and Hinata is the Hyuuga heiress as well as top kunoichi. Naruto doesn't seem to be remarkable outside of the fact that he's on their team, yet doesn't seem to have any spying skills. They've done very few D-rank missions, but they have two C-rank and even an A rank!" This time, Sasuke just stared at the cards, willing them to burst to flame and erase any evidence of their superiority to him.

"Well, I don't have much on this Haran of yours, and what I've got is really old." This time, it was Haran and Hinata that seemed to become interested, although they were good enough to hide it. "There was a Hyuuga Haran born twelve years ago, the night of the Kyuubi attack, but the reports say that he died shortly afterwards."

"What's with all these Hyuuga's anyway?" Sakura asked, eying Hinata from her position in the group.

"The Hyuuga are one of, if not the most, influential group in Konoha. They are famous for their taijutsu style, the jyuken, as well as the byakugan." The older kid filled the pink kunoichi in.

"So they must be a pretty big clan if they're that powerful." Ino surmised.

"That's right; they are quite large, though it is the Branch family that makes up most of the population. The branch family guards the main family with their lives. With such a big clan, it's really interesting, that the two Hyuuga entering this exam are actually cousins."

This got Hinata many more stares from her former classmates. They were about to ask a question, when the still unknown boy spoke up again.

"…and it gets better, that Haran that you asked about, he was Hinata's twin brother, so I guess there could've been three Hyuuga in this exam."

At this, the stared grew even stronger, and Hinata 'broke down crying'.

"Thanks a bunch, you jack ass! She doesn't like to talk about her brother!" Naruto yelled, as Shino actually glared at the older boy. The two lead their female teammate away from the assembled group, having gotten all of the information they wanted.

A short while later, the proctor for the first exam entered the room in a puff of smoke. Morino Ibiki was a large muscular man who had a taste for black clothing.

"Alright you maggots, I'm Morino Ibiki, and I'm the proctor for this first part of your exam. You've all been assigned seats and you have about…thirty seconds left to find them. Anyone who is sitting in an incorrect seat will automatically fail, along with their teammates!"

Thus, a mad rush to find the correct seats began, with more than a few teams failing to make it to their assigned seats.

"The first exam will be a paper test consisting of ten questions. You start the exam with ten points out of ten, but for each question you miss, one point will be subtracted from your total score. If you are caught cheating in any way, two points will be subtracted from your score. This is a team exam, so if one of you fail, your entire team will fail. Each team member must have at least one point for their test, if any one of your team member's test reaches zero points, you all fail. As a team, you must receive a total score of at least seventy-five percent or better. You will have forty-five minutes to answer the first nine questions. When that time is up, I will give you the tenth question, and once the remaining time has elapsed, we will grade the tests."

Ibiki signaled to the chuunin that were sitting in on the exam to hand out the exams. Once that was finished, Ibiki took another look over the crowd and after determining that they were sufficiently worried, began the exam.

Haran looked at his test, and quickly realized that the questions were too hard for a genin to answer, but something was still off. He had realized that the purpose of the exam was to cheat in a way that wouldn't be caught, but for an exam that was supposed to fool a sannin…something was lacking. He activated his byakugan and looked around to try and find someone with answers. To his surprise there were three genin scribbling furiously on their papers, each was far ahead of any one else in the room, so he assumed they were planted to provide the answers. However, as he looked over their answers, he realized why this test would be harder than originally thought. Each 'genin' was writing different answers! That meant that there might be only one with the right answers, or maybe each was righting down a couple of the correct answers…or maybe, they were all wrong and the plants were there to deceive the actual teams. The number of possibilities began to weigh on his mind, and he felt a headache coming on.

This wasn't just a test of a team's ability to gather information; it was also a test of their ability to determine what good data was. That meant that they weren't joking when they said they would be grading the exams at the end. Haran smirked, for his team, this would be a cinch.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Team after team began to drop out, until over three quarters of the total had been eliminated, and it had only been thirty minutes! Time kept marching on, and more teams were eliminated, until the magical forty-five minute mark was hit.

"It's time for the tenth question." Ibiki's voice rang out over the room; gather the attention of every remaining team. "The tenth question is one of trust and guts. If you feel you are up to the challenge of the question, you may remain, but if you miss the question, not only will your points be immediately reduced to zero, thus failing you and your team; you will be forever banned from taking the chuunin exam again…as long as you live. If you aren't up to the task, you may quit, costing your team the chance to advance further in this exam, but you will retain the ability to take this exam again. So the choice is between letting your team down or staying genin forever."

The announcement was met with many different voices of outrage and even those that didn't raise their voices were staring in disbelief.

'There's no way he's serious…is there?' Hinata was beginning to worry about this new twist. She was sure that her team had the correct answers; she had been watching her brother and Shino gather their information as they had done many times before, but with the new twist…

By the time she had finished her thought, six of the remaining sixteen teams had quit, drastically reducing their numbers even further. Eventually there reached a point where it looked as if no one else would raise their hand. Ibiki took one more look over the room before ordering the chuunin watchers to collect and grade the papers.

"That was the tenth question. By deciding to stay you have demonstrated that you are confident in both your own ability as well as your teams. This is especially important on missions that a chuunin will be asked to undertake. While a chuunin is a squad leader, if he or she cannot trust their team, then the mission will be a failure." His speech was punctuated by a handful of kunai thudding into the wooden desks of various teams.

"These kunai don't just represent the end of your exams, they signify the end of your life. You haven't been able to locate good information and have just cost your teammates their lives. In this world of ours, information is as valuable as gold. Good information is the difference between life and death, success or failure." The teams that had failed marched out of the room leaving only those who truly had the skills of a chuunin behind to face the second exam.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Ok, well, I'm not too happy with the chapter, I just couldn't come up with a new test that would be challenging and yet play to Team Seven somehow. So I hope the new twists will keep you happy until the next exam.**

**I'm sorry this took so long, but I've just been too engrossed with 'Mirage' lately to concentrate on this story. I swear that I am not giving up on this story, but I just have gotten this really strong urge to work on Mirage, especially now that I've gotten to the awesomely sweet part.**

**Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, and to those who just wrote in to let me know what they thought about my question, thanks to you guys also. So please review this chapter and I promise that I'll try and update soon, but I really want to advance Mirage some more, so no promises.)**


	12. Chapter 12

No sooner had the last failing team left, than one of the windows exploded into the room, followed by a kunoichi in a trench coat who managed to land just as a banner unfurled itself behind her.

"All right you brats, I'm Mitarashi Anko, and I'm the examiner for the next portion of this exam!" The silence wasn't what she was expecting and took a quick look around the room.

"Damn, Ibiki, I know you can be a tough ass, but there are only eight teams left! You didn't leave any for me to have fun with, you louse!"

The first instructor just shook his head and began to mumble to himself. Something along the lines of 'If there were any more you would complain that I was going soft.'

"Aww, do you think that little of me?" The weird jounin had turned and was shedding fake tears for the jab at her. Instantly Ibiki, never one to hurt a woman's feelings, tried to apologize, only for Anko to turn back to the genin and was ordering them to meet her at training area forty-four in ten minutes.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Ten minutes later, at the specified training ground, all of the teams were waiting for the instructor to speak on their task.

"All right, listen up! Since there are so few of you left, my first plan has been thrown out the window, and when that happens, my secondary plans usually involve lots of pain, so you can consider yourself lucky." The corners of her mouth curled into a grin at those words, before she continued her speech.

"The first order of business is for everyone to sign these release papers! In this exam some of you will die, and it is not the Leaf villages fault that you weren't prepared for your own deaths, this is just a formality." When every team had handed in their forms and she checked over them all, the rules and objective was explained.

"Ok, listen up, 'cuz I'm only gonna say this once! Each team will draw a number from this box. That number is the gate where you will enter the forest behind me. This is Konoha's legendary training ground forty-four, the forest of death! Inside the forest exist all manner of perils, from poisonous plants and animals, to downright enormous insects." (It should be noted that upon this announcement, Shino's eyes picked up.) "Your mission will be recovery. At your gate, each team will be given a scroll and an opposing team from which you must retrieve their scroll. Each scroll has been marked by our proctors, so it's no use trying to make a fake scroll, even if you knew what was in it. That actually leads me to my next point, if you look inside your scroll or any scroll you may come across, you will be disqualified! Also, you are to go after your specified target and no other! If you finish this test with any scroll, other than the one you are supposed to, or attack at team other the specified one, your team will be eliminated. In this round, killing is legal, and although this is still a team exam, should your team come up…short, the remaining members will be allowed to continue on, since there are so few of you. Once you have the scrolls, you must make it to the tower in the center of the forest. Once there you are considered safe, and no fighting may happen inside the walls of the tower. You only have three days to finish this task, since there are so few of you, so make good use of your time."

Each team went to their specific gate and received their assignments. Of the eight remaining teams, five were from the leaf. Team Seven, Eight and Ten; Team Gai and Kabuto's team were all alive and running for the title of chuunin. There was the Sand team still there, as well as a team from Grass and from Rain. Team Eight was supposed to go after Team Seven, of all people, and recover their scroll. Unbeknownst to Team Eight, Team seven was supposed to go after team Gai. Team Ten was to go after the team from Grass and coincidentally, the Grass team was supposed to find team Ten. Team Gai was going to find the Rain team and the Rain squad was to find team Eight. This left the Sand team to find Kabuto's team and vise versa.

The teams were all let into the forest shortly after receiving their assignments and each quickly took to their own specialties. Team eight began to scan for their opponents, mostly though Shino's connections with the insects in the forest, though the twin's byakugan helped to avoid any teams that they needn't concern themselves with.

Team ten was strategizing for their confrontation with the grass team, all they while Kiba and Akamaru were keeping a nose out for other teams.

Team seven was being their usual dysfunctional selves. They…well Sasuke, had decided that it would be better to set traps for their team, though there wasn't very much thought to the placement of their traps, and instead of placing them near the tower, where every team would have to go eventually, they set their traps in the middle of the area where they were dropped off.

Team Gai decided to wait the first day out, hoping that rain team would tire themselves out trying to find their own target. Neji's byakugan had picked out team seven a ways off, but they seemed more interested in trap making than this exam.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

About three and a half hours into the exam, the first sightings of the Rain team began to show up on the twins extended vision. The three weren't any threat to the team and team eight knew it. Their chakra levels were only marginally better than team seven's and they even had worse test scores than the most inexperienced team Konoha had to offer.

By the time that the foreign team got close enough to see their targets, Shino had attached over 200 kikaichu to the team and their chakra was already at half of what they were at full strength. They felt their chakra do down, but attributed it to the forest and their running, not to Shino's sabotage. They saw the members of team eight sitting around a small, smokeless, fire and decided it would be a good time to get the drop on them. However, as each member of the team stabbed their target leaf nin, they were shocked to quickly find themselves covered in chakra leaching insects that drained what little chakra they had left very quickly. The twins quickly put them out of action for a good while longer, and decided it would benefit them to take the now incapacitated ninja's scroll. That way, they could give it to another leaf team or destroy it, should it belong to one of the other teams. As long as they didn't check into the tower with the stolen scroll, they couldn't be penalized. They put the fire out and moved away from the rain ninja, there was no need to be there and team seven would need to be found tomorrow.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

The next day came with no disturbances during the night. Shino had some insects out scouting for team seven's location and upon waking up, received the news that they had come in contact with the grass team and come out the worse for the encounter. The Kikaichu he had sent out reported that Uchiha Sasuke now had some new, dark, chakra flowing through his body and that Ino had been injured to the point of unconsciousness, while Sakura was only hurt in her pride. When he relayed the information to his team, Shino calmly pointed out that this would be the perfect chance to capture their target scroll, with Sakura the only 'able' fighter among the group. The destruction insects relayed their position about three miles away from team eight currently, and noted that there were two other teams in the area. Team Gai was within byakugan range of the team, and the two other members of Kabuto's team were watching team seven from the shadows of the trees surrounding the hastily chosen shelter.

The twins agreed that, while it might be a low blow, this was their chance to take their scroll and be done with this mission. Kurenai's students moved out quickly, and within thirty minutes they had arrived at the clearing where Sakura had made camp the night before. The pink haired kunoichi was kneeling on the ground, battered and bruised, but mostly in shock at the scene that played out before her. The two members of Kabuto's team had attacked her early in the morning, after she had stayed up all night watching over her team. She knew she was in over her head as soon as her trap failed to stop the duo and she had put up the best fight that she knew how, but it was far too little.

Then Lee had shown up, that green spandex wearing freak that had beaten Sasuke before this exam even started had come to her defense, and had put up a great fight. He had been winning until the two, now reveled Sound ninja, began attacking him in tandem. Individually, neither one was a match for the taijutsu specialist and even when it was two on one he had put up a great fight, however, eventually the duo wore him down until he too was kneeling on the ground, unable to move thanks to a sonic attack one of the two had used, as the victorious ninja moved towards Sasuke. It was at this point that Team eight and coincidentally team Gai arrived at the scene. Neji and Tenten had been looking for Lee ever since he failed to check in with them at the specified time and had found him just in time it appeared. Neji was all for taking Lee and getting out of there, but the arrival of his cousin(s) piqued his interest enough to stick around.

With a sudden burst of evil feeling chakra, Sasuke awoke, just as a kunai was about to impale his skull and kicked his attacker away. The two were surprised that Sasuke was able to stand so soon after the cursed seal of heaven had been given to him and took a step back to calculate their options. In less time than the blink of an eye, Sasuke had dashed from the underhand he had slept in and charged the two leaf ninja, not knowing they were traitors or that they had injured Sakura. He just wanted a fight, and those two had volunteered themselves by attempting to kill him.

The sound ninja realized what the seal meant and realized that if they killed Sasuke, they would be in deeper trouble then they would for failing to kill him. Kabuto had already split off and delivered their scroll to the Sand team and although Gaara wasn't happy about not being able to kill anyone, they accepted the scroll, knowing that Orochimaru's lieutenant was needed in another place for the invasion of Konoha to go off. Gaara was needed in the finals and so he would have to accept the scroll for now.

Being spies themselves, the sound ninja faked being scared of Sasuke's power, and though it did dwarf their own reserves, he wasn't nearly as much of a threat as Kabuto was and so they stroked his ego before running off into the forest to 'lick their wounds' from this 'humiliating defeat', despite not taking any damage from Sasuke.

Sasuke, aside from releasing an alarming amount of chakra that felt far more sinister than anything the teams had felt before, had odd black flame marks slowly burning themselves across his skin and a maniacal look in his sharingan eyes.

"Finally…this power…this is what I need to defeat him! I am an avenger, I have forgotten that, and even if I must walk in the shadow of the devil to achieve this power, I must have it!" He began to laugh in a fashion not unbecoming of an insane shinobi, driven mad by the deeds he had seen and done in his tenure as a tool for his village.

"I must test this power further, you will fight me!" Sasuke's new cry of power hungry rage was directed at Neji who was still on the other side of the clearing from the power tripping Uchiha. Sasuke's charge wasn't hard to counter for the former rookie and although Tenten had to grab Lee and jump to safety, Sasuke charge did nothing for him strategically. Charging the branch family genius once more, Sasuke was knocked to the other side of the clearing, right in front of team eight by a double palm thrust.

The jyuken strike had hurt a lot more than Sasuke had thought it would, and even in this cursed state, he had trouble standing up from the blow. As the markings spread further over his body, he began to charge Neji once more. This time however, Haran had seen enough and his team sprung into action. Shino's insects obstructed Sasuke's movement, only for a second, but it gave Haran enough time to grab his left shoulder in a restraining motion. Unnoticed by Sakura, Lee, Tenten and the freshly awoken Ino, Haran was pushing an enormous amount of his own chakra into the newly formed chakra pathways that the cursed seal had created, not just blocking them, but destroying the pathways at the tenketsu and stopping the spread of the tainted chakra.

Sasuke let out an almost inhuman scream as part of his chakra system was destroyed and his newly discovered power was halted in its tracks. Shino, Hinata and Neji were shocked by the damage that Haran was able to do, especially since it seemed to have the penetrating power of lightning natured chakra in it. Hinata shot her younger brother a look of interest and Shino just kept his eyes on Team Gai. Neji was shocked that the dead last knew the jyuken! Had it been Hinata who had destroyed the Uchiha's chakra system, he would've been alright with it, sure he would have questioned how someone as weak as her could accomplish the feat, but she was a Hyuuga after all, and perhaps somewhere deep down within her, she had the talent that was ingrained into every member of the clan.

Haran let Sasuke fall from his grip and watched as the dark avenger was once more rendered unconscious in this exam. Hinata walked over to Sakura and checked on her wounds, finding nothing more than some minor cuts and bruising. Ino had shakily stood up and walked over to her friend as well and it was that action that reminded Hinata of her team's purpose of being in the area in the first place.

"Ino-san, we have come to take your scroll, neither you nor your team has the ability to fight the three of us, so please just give us the scroll." While she didn't think it would work, Hinata knew that an opportunity to end a conflict via peaceful means was always best.

"You're right." Ino let out a sigh before releasing an angry huff in rapid succession. "It's not like we could advance anyway, stupid Uchiha." Now it was both of the other teams turns to be shocked, as the normally feisty blonde handed over their scroll to Hinata over the protests of Sakura.

"How did you know that you weren't eligible for promotion?" Shino inquired politely.

Ino blushed a bit.

"Well, during the first exam, I went to switch minds with Sakura and I missed and hit one of the plants instead. He knew about Kakashi not nominating us, and how Sasuke was being targeting by Orochimaru, fat load of good that info did me though."

Team eight nodded and began to help team seven heal their minor wounds, when Neji's voice carried over the clearing.

"Whose scroll is that you have?"

It was Shino who answered the question, cutting off Haran who was going to answer with something more argumentative than was necessary.

"The rain team attempted to ambush us last night. Is that the team you were supposed to hunt?"

"Yeah, it was." Tenten answered, still supporting a barely conscious Lee. "Um…do you think we could have it?"

Shino just took their pilfered scroll and tossed it to team Gai, unhappy about having to let another team pass this exam, but at least it was a Leaf squad. Having gotten the scroll they needed, Team Gai quickly headed out and towards the tower; while team eight began to help team seven heal and move Sasuke to the tower for medical observation. None of the five conscious shinobi felt like they were being watched, though they were. As Neji and his team made their way towards the tower, his byakugan was focused on one figure. Uzumaki Naruto, if that was his name knew the jyuken and had been able to combine it with chakra nature manipulation and Neji needed to know how.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Once again, I have the same feelings as last chapter, I like the cannon events so much that I have a hard way to change them for this story. Hopefully I have explained the slight differences enough that no one is left behind and hopefully you liked the chapter. **

**First I'd like to say that Haran hasn't mastered his nature manipulation, he has just enough control to push the nature through a jyuken strike, something that is easier (at least in my world) than it is through another method, and even then, only when he had sustained contact with the victim. **

**Secondly, Sasuke still has the seal, and it is still pulling him to Orochimaru, but it no longer can pull chakra from his body, as the pathways it made have been destroyed.**

**Thank you for all the reviews you have written me for the last chapter, I'm glad that so many of you like this story and for those of you who reviewed in the past week, you guys should get some credit for getting me to write this when I have. I was going to write the next chapter of Mirage, but this just seemed to flow easier and so here it is! Please keep reviewing and as always, any questions you have you can feel free to pm me.)**


	13. Chapter 13

"THIS. IS. SO. STUPID!" Haran's words were punctuated by his fists smacking against the wood of a training dummy. He backed off; deciding that it was time for a break and laid down in the soft grass of the glen he was training in. His current funk was partially due to his inability to perform the academy taijutsu as well as he could use the jyuken and the second reason he was so angry was because he had to learn this infernal style or else he would be revealed in the final round of the chuunin exams in a month. With only three teams emerging from the forest with both scrolls, there was no need for preliminary matches; in fact, there were too few teams to make an all day trip worth while for the VIP guests that would attend. It was for that reason that Team ten was allowed to pass as well, making six first round matches. Haran, as well as his teammates had little doubt that they would be allowed to pass, considering the fact that the team they were supposed to track had been killed and later impersonated by an S-class criminal. The draws had been done immediately, to allow the maximum amount of time for the fighters to prepare for each other. The twelve remaining genin drew their lots by teams and the first ones to go had been Team Ten. Shikamaru drew number four; Chouji had drawn number eleven and Kiba number seven. Next up had been the sand team, Temari and Kankuro would try and get as large a berth of space as possible when they had to walk past their brother to pick out their numbers. It had been over a week since his last kill, making the red head overly bloodthirsty. Kankuro had picked nine and Temari twelve. Gaara didn't even move from his spot, his sand drew the number six for him.

It was down to the final two Leaf teams, each with some extremely promising ninja. Rock Lee, the previous year's dead last was now the foremost taijutsu user under the age of twenty that didn't belong to a clan. The fact that he was nearly devoid of any chakra made him work even harder on his taijutsu, and so he had pushed himself passed every physical limit he knew of and was still growing. He had yelped something about the flames of soup…err…telephone booth? Um, maybe it was truth…Haran couldn't remember, he had been too deep in thought about Uchiha Sasuke's actions to think straight. Apparently it was a good thing, because by the time the boy had drawn the eighth lot, the entirety of the genin ninja were closing their ears or waving their hands in front of their eyes, testing to see if they still worked. Even Gaara's sand had risen to block Lee from his view; obviously it had seen the green spandex as a threat and tried to neutralize it. The next person to select their number had been Tenten, the kunoichi that was on Neji's team along with Lee. She had drawn the third lot, making a match up between her and Shikamaru that Haran thought was quite favorable for the girl. Neji was the last to draw from his team, and emotionlessly draw the first lot. This was one of the worst possible scenarios for the Hyuuga twins. There were three spots left open, one against Neji, one against Gaara and the other was against the red heads brother. Best case scenario…only one of the twins had to fight Neji or Gaara. Worst case…Haran tried not to think about what could have been. They had gotten lucky, relatively speaking. Hinata had drawn Kankuro as an opponent and Shino had the poor luck of getting Neji, a tough match to be sure, but not un-winnable. This of course left Haran and Gaara, fitting in that Haran was probably the only one in the tournament that could fight Gaara and not be overwhelmed by sheer force.

It was still a bad match up because the only real weapon that the young Hyuuga had was his jyuken, which if he showed off, would blow the lid off the proverbial cookie jar. He wasn't sure he was ready to do that just yet. Deciding that he had lain idle long enough, he ran a hand through his fading blond hair before speaking.

"I know you're out there, show yourself."

For a moment nothing happened but before long a shimmer appeared in a tree overlooking the grassy patch and the relaxing boy. The shimmer eventually died down and revealed an older man with long white hair who was wearing some…interesting clothes. Jiraiya the legendary toad hermit and famous perverted author dropped to the floor of the forest, eyeing the boy who had seen through his disguise. After a momentary stare down, the old man's eyes lit up before his mouth split into a grin.

"Ah, a Hyuuga, that explains a bit."

Now it was Haran's turn to be shocked. While his physical disguise was beginning to fade, he was using a genjutsu that Kurenai had him learn to hide his appearance. It was apparently based of a creation of Tsunade, the legendary Sannin, so for this man to break it, he must be a pretty powerful ninja.

"And you would be?" The Hyuuga asked, dropping the illusion, since all it was doing now was eating up his chakra.

"WHAT! You mean you don't recognize me? I'm the legendary Toad hermit, I am the man with no enemies in the north, south, east or west, I am the great Jiraiya-sama!"

"You're the author of those perverted books that Hatake-san reads." Haran had stood up and brushed his shorts off. "Of course I know of the 'legendary' Jiraya, I just wanted to see if you actually did that silly introduction that I've heard about." Jiraiya laughed as he walked closer to the young demon vessel and clapped his arm around Haran's shoulders.

"I like you kid, you got a good sense of humor."

"So are you gonna tell me why you were spying on me? I wouldn't think you were gay, what with those books you write."

"Now, now, spying is such a harsh word…I was watching you train is all. For a Hyuuga you don't seem that good at taijutsu."

"Humph! It's just that stupid academy style; it's so basic and choppy. I'm probably the best at the jyuken within four years of my age. I just can't get used to this…this…crap!"

Jiraiya had moved over to a tree and sat at its roots as Haran explained himself to the Sannin. "If you're so great at your family's style, than why are you trying to learn that weak style?" Jiraiya had walked blindly into this meeting; he was in Konoha just to do some research and just happened to spot a boy who strongly resembled his former student.

"I'm Hinata's younger brother; I have to stay hidden from the clan so that we can avoid the caged bird seal. Hinata has been hiding her true abilities so that Hanabi doesn't get branded and if I were to reveal myself, then I would either get the seal, or neechan would."

"And you're trying to improve on a taijutsu style that isn't your own why?" Jiraiya was just prying for information now, he knew all about the chuunin exam finals and how the finals would proceed.

"I'm fighting Sabaku no Gaara, from Suna. He's got this sand that moves like it's alive. I figured that the best way to get around it would be with taijutsu and speed. I just can't use the jyuken."

"Well, I suppose it could've been worse." Jiraiya pondered out loud. "You could've been paired against that cousin of yours."

Haran let out a snort of amusement. "True, if I had to fight Neji, I would've had no choice but to reveal myself."

Jiraiya's mood changed from jovial to serious. "You know that Gaara is like you, right?" Haran responded before the entire weight of the question fell on him.

"Yeah, I know he's got demonic chakra, we saw it before the first exam began. I haven't had any luck in drawing on the Kyuubi's chakra yet; neechan and I have been trying for nearly as long as I can remember." His response to the question was reflexive and it wasn't until he got to the end of his sentence that he realized what Jiraiya must have known. "Wait! How did you know about the Kyuubi? I thought that was supposed to be a giant secret?"

"Kid, you've got a lot to learn about the world we live in and the first rule is that there are no such thing as secrets. Besides the you and Gaara, there are at least another five jinchuriki, that's what people have been calling you guys, and I can give you any one of their life stories."

For a moment Haran was shocked. "F-f-five others?"

"Yeah, there's one form Kumogakure, one from Iwa, one was in Mist, he's suddenly disappeared along with the vessel from Takigakure. The last one used to be from a small town near what was once the hidden whirlpool village, but she's long since been moving around, making it hard to pinpoint her."

Haran was still shocked to discover that there were other people out there that had the same infliction he had. His face began to twist into a serious thinking face, which apparently was pretty funny looking, because Jiraiya started to crack up in laughter again.

"Kid, I'm sorry, but if you don't stop contorting your face that way you'll scare off all the hot babes and then I might have to kill you." Now Haran's elastic face seemed confused and Jiraiya snickered again. "Look kid-"

"Haran."

"'M sorry?"

"My name is Haran."

"Well I didn't know that."

"Well you didn't bother to ask, now did you?"

"Look, I'm sorry, ok."

Haran decided to accept the token apology and allow the toad hermit to continue on with his original train of thought.

"Anyway, Haran, you got my interest, something that's pretty hard to do, so I'll train you for the finals."

"And why do I want training from a pervert and an old one at that?" Haran crossed his arms over his chest.

"Because, I can help you draw out your demon's chakra. You'll need to do that if you want to win against Gaara in the final round."

Obviously this had Haran's attention.

"How do you intend to help me with that?" Byakugan eyes tried to bore through Jiraiya with no effect.

"If you get rid of all of your regular chakra, than you'll have no choice but to use the Kyuubi's chakra. I'll have to teach you a pretty advanced technique that uses a lot of chakra since your reserves are larger than any Hyuuga I've ever seen and I'm assuming that your control is pretty good. Hmm…tell you what, meet me here tomorrow at nine and I'll have an entire training schedule for you. In one month kid, your own sister won't recognize you." With that, Jiraiya had disappeared in a swirl of leaves while Haran yelled at his disappearing body.

"I'M THIRTEEN YOU BASTARD; I'M NOT A KID ANYMORE!"

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Neji had finished his training for the day, and was walking back to the Hyuuga clan compound when he spotted the blond haired boy from his cousin's team. His actions in the Forest of Death had caught Neji's attention, though it seemed that he had simply grabbed the Uchiha's shoulder by coincidence, it was a precise strike by the blond. Then there was the fact that he had forcefully injected his own chakra into Sasuke's chakra system, in just enough quantity to destroy the tenketsu around that oddly shaped mark.

Deciding that it might be a good idea to follow the boy, Neji turned around and tailed the boy back to a run down apartment building in a poorer section of town. The blond pulled out a key ring and fiddled with them until he pulled the right one out and unlocked his door. He was halfway through the threshold when he stopped and yelled without turning his head.

"Hey, Hyuuga, you want to come in or are you gonna keep stalking me all day?"

Surprised that he had been discovered by the dobe, Neji had no choice but to accept the invitation. The first thing that he noticed was that the inside of Naruto's apartment was in much better shape than the outside of the building. It was neat and well cared for, with a kitchen table big enough for three or four and a nearly spotless kitchen.

"You want something to eat or drink?" Haran asked his stunned cousin. When Neji didn't answer he just shrugged his shoulders and filled up an extra glass with ice water, just in case Neji changed his mind.

When Neji snapped back form admiring the surroundings, he quickly remembered why he was in this predicament in the first place.

"How did you know I was following you?" He asked, accepting the glass of water from Naruto with a curt nod of his head.

"It's something that Kurenai-sensei had me work on, since I am the only one on my team without a kekki genkai. It's kind of a sixth sense; I can feel chakra in the area around me. I just happened to remember the feel of your chakra from the exams." Naruto spoke while sipping his water and swirling the liquid around, trying to melt the ice cubes a bit faster. It was true, Kurenai had him work on an exercise that was similar to that, but it was more like a barrier that told him whenever someone came within a certain distance, letting him know when to activate his byakugan.

Neji bought the lie hook line and sinker. Not even his experience in reading peoples body language could help him detect the tiny fib that Naruto had told him.

"So, why did you think it would be a good idea to follow me around? Did you think I was going to help you train for Shino? Obviously you'd be wrong, but I still want to know about your little stalking excursion."

Neji put his glass down and the ice clinked against its walls as he eyed Naruto.

"I want to know how you could blow out the Uchiha's tenketsu. If Hinata-sama taught you the jyuken she would be in a world of trouble, it is unlawful for a Hyuuga to teach the clan's secrets to a non member."

Naruto frowned at Neji. "Ten-whats? I don't know what you're saying. Hinata-chan never taught me the jyuken; I don't get how you could accuse your own cousin like that." He said his face the picture of stupidity.

"That's a lie." Neji smirked. "You forced your own chakra into Uchiha's system, you blew out part of his chakra system, and it takes a precise amount of chakra to do that without causing damage to the entire system. Besides, you used lightning natured chakra to do it."

"Really? That's kinda cool; I never knew I blew out his chakra system! Does that mean that he can't do any techniques any more? He was always such a teme anyway..." Naruto continued to babble on while Neji continued to sit and stare at the blond in disbelief. He had done it on accident?

"Wait, wait!" Neji had to shout to get Naruto to be quiet. "You're telling me that you had no idea what you were doing to Sasuke when you attacked him?"

"Of course I had an idea!" Naruto defended. "And I thought it worked too! See, Hinata-chan had mentioned some medical technique that mixes up a person's body; something about electrical porpoises…or…pomegranates…no…PULSES! That was it, electrical pulses and it makes them act all funny. Anyway, I asked Kurenai-sensei about it and she told me that I didn't have the control to try something that advanced, but she did show me another lighting attack. It's supposed to shock the person you're aiming it at and I thought it worked, I guess it might've had a second effect, but all I wanted to do was shock that teme's ass." He smiled a mile wide at Neji who had his mouth open in shock at how unbelievably lucky and stupid the boy across the table from him was.

"Hey, do mind if I ask you a question?" Naruto asked innocently enough. When Neji didn't say no, he assumed it would be ok and proceeded. "What do you have against Hinata-chan? You call her Hinata-sama with the same tone of voice that Kurenai-sensei refers to Hatake-san with. It's like she doesn't want to recognize him by talking with him, but she has to anyway, so she acts all polite."

"It's because she is the heiress of the main house of the Hyuuga clan, she represents their ideals and their legacy of hatred." He was about to continue but the blond interrupted him.

"Hinata-chan? Hate? Is that even possible? Oh, wait, I see, is this going to be another one of those things like with Iwagakure, how they hate us just because of the Yondaime, even though he's dead? That's really stupid, how could you hate Hinata-chan? I bet you can't name one specific thing about her that you hate." Naruto seemed confused, but inside, Haran was smirking like the cat that caught the canary.

Sure enough, Neji was stumped. His knee-jerk reaction was to call her weak, but he couldn't make that claim anymore. Ever since she had graduated from the academy she had quickly increased her skills and confidence. It was like there was glass ceiling that she had smashed and shot through.

"Look, I don't care if you hate your clan, or your family, but seriously, how can you hate Hinata? I shudder to imagine what the team would've been like if Kurenai-sensei had your views of Hinata. Her jounin sensei was your father, you realize that right? Kurenai blamed Hinata's dad for his death, but she actually requested for Hinata to be on her team. She was able to separate Hinata from her father and treat her as her own person."

Neji remembered the three teenagers that his father would bring home every once in a while, just vaguely, but he could remember them. He hadn't thought about it, but the genjutsu mistress was definitely one of those three.

Naruto stretched his arms and yawned. "Look, as great a conversation as this is, I'm pretty beat. I don't mean to be rude or anything, but you'll have to do your thinking on your way back."

On his way out of Naruto's apartment, Neji realized just how much the blond had made him think about. While he was still plenty angry with the main house, he couldn't really blame Hinata; it would be like blaming a match for burning down a house when struck by an arsonist. It didn't matter, tomorrow there would be plenty of time to think and maybe to apologize to Hinata, but it was getting dark and so it could wait.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: I know that many of you have been waiting for this for about five months now, and I'm truly sorry that it's taken so long, but I was way too busy with school work and a full time job that I never got the time. Then, when time presented itself, I found myself writer's blocked so far into a corner that I just couldn't think of anything or any way to continue the plot. I guess you could consider the past five months a kind of temporary hiatus for me, but hopefully you've noticed that in the past two or three weeks, this is my third update, so I'm back baby!**

**Although I've been concentrating on Naruto of the Mirage, this story probably has the most public demand of my stories, so it'll be worked on until it is finished. **

**I apologize for the filler chapter, but I needed someway to break the block on my mind and this is all I thought of. Jiraiya gets introduced and Neji and Haran have a meeting of the minds. Nothing too big or too fancy, but necessary.**

**Thanks to everyone that reviewed the last chapter and to those who have been waiting patiently for this chapter, please help a poor man out and review, please!**

**Any way, next chapter we get some fighting, Haran and Gaara are set to go at it, it was originally going to be a Neji vs. Haran thing, but I didn't feel like leaving Shino with Gaara. Don't worry, I'm going to have the two geniuses square off before too long, either before the Tsunade retrieval mission, or right after it, not sure yet.**

**Anyway, next up on the list of stories to update is either Mirage or Aiko…who knows; maybe you'll get both pretty soon. I got an Alphasmart for my birthday, so my typing capabilities have been extended greatly.)**


	14. Chapter 14

The finalists of the chuunin selection exams stood in the middle of the arena, while the sold out crowd yelled and hollered in anticipation of the fights to come

The finalists of the chuunin selection exams stood in the middle of the arena, while the sold out crowd yelled and hollered in anticipation of the fights to come. Despite the lack of Uchiha Sasuke, (though not for a lack of trying on some council member's parts), the turn out was spectacular, daimyos from all elemental countries had come to watch the spectacle and the Kazekage would be there in person as well. Down in the arena, Hinata could almost feel the emotion and anxiousness roll off the crowd, they wanted the fights to get underway…in particular, they wanted her fight to begin.

It had come as a surprise to the Hyuuga heiress that her match was billed as the marquee match-up in this final round, and not Shino vs. Neji, or her brother against Sabaku no Gaara. The draw of a match up featuring the heiress of the strongest clan in Konoha, and the eldest son of the sitting Kazekage, was just too great to pass up, and the total sum of money placed on that match alone was mind numbingly large.

Not surprisingly, the odds were heavily against 'Naruto', though that hadn't stopped Hiashi from betting on his own son. Though the amount was rather small, he stood to gain nearly thirty times his bet when his son won.

The proctor for this portion of the exam, Shiranui Genma, cleared his throat to get the gennin's attention.

"Due to a perceived uneven distribution of 'quality' matches, there will be no set order of matches. You're opponent will stay the same, but the order in which you fight is no longer assured to be what you were told it was." He announced; causing Rock Lee to shout something about wanting to go first to show how youthful he was.

Genma looked up to the special box, reserved for the Hokage and his guests, and upon receiving the signal to begin, snapped his fingers and an electronic display lit up on the wall of the stadium. Randomly, the names of the different contestants began to cycle on the board, until eventually it slowed down and eventually stopped at the first match.

Rock Lee vs. Inuzuka Kiba.

The mini clone of Maito Gai yelled in joy and waited for the other contestants to reach the box where they would wait for their matches.

Just before the signal to begin was given, Kiba, being the overly brash and self absorbed person he is, decided to try and play some mind games with his opponent.

"You should just give up right now!" He boasted, while Akamaru eyed the…odd boy his master was supposed to fight. "You wore the wrong color spandex for this fight, there isn't enough foliage for you to hide in, and besides, Akamaru's nose would find you faster than the Yondaime!"

Lee just smiled at his comrade's mistaken interpretation of his choice in clothing.

"Kiba-san, I'm afraid you are mistaken! I don't wear this most youthful color because I need to blend in with the trees; I wear it because it is the color of youth and vitality!"

Just then, Genma gave the signal to begin, and…well, suffice it to say that Kiba didn't last very long. In fact, he lasted exactly two kicks and one punch. The first foot caught him completely by surprise, right in the stomach, launching the Inuzuka backwards, towards the wall at high velocity. The second kick launched him upward, and the follow up punch to the face caused the young man to impact with the wall of the arena, mercifully sending him into unconsciousness and ending the rather one sided match. Total time, five seconds.

Murmurs and hushed whispers rippled through the crowd. That was the dead last of the previous graduating class? What had Gai done to the boy to bring him up to this level? More importantly, how powerful were his teammates?

Kiba was removed from the arena and taken to a first aid tent to be tended to, while Lee reveled in his victory by doing victory laps around the stadium…on one hand…backwards. Anyway, once Genma had convinced the bubbling and bouncing boy that he must return to the box and allow the next fight on, the murmuring had died down a bit, as the display board sprang to life again.

Hyuuga Hinata vs. Sabaku no Kankuro.

The most lucrative fight and it was the second one to be held! Hinata, after receiving well wishes from her friends and brother, headed down to the arena floor by leaping onto the railing of the box and walking down the wall, impressing many of the shinobi in the stadium. While it might seem like an easy feat if one knows the tree climbing exercise, it is actually twice as hard to walk down a surface, than to walk up one. Not only is gravity pulling you down to earth, but your momentum is now heading earthwards, and not skywards. The slower one can walk down a wall or other vertical surface, the better chakra control they are showing, and Hinata was almost crawling down the wall.

Though he tried not to show it, Kankuro was nervous. First off, he recognized Hinata's show of power for what it was, and knew that she had better control than he did, but also, the random match order had thrown a monkey wrench into the invasion plans. Gaara was supposed to fight first, while his siblings would save their techniques for when the invasion began in earnest. He couldn't fight and keep the new weapons he had installed in his puppet, Karasu, a secret, but if he forfeited the match, not only would all the money the Wind daimyo's placed on him be wasted, but he would loose face in front of his fellow ninja.

He had no choice, he would have to fight, and win! He walked down to the arena, and while he was out of sight of the crowd, switched places with Karasu, taking the place of the puppet in the linen bandages wrapped up and carried on the puppet's back. From here, he could control his weapon and be well hidden from detection.

In the stands, Hiashi and Hanabi were waiting in anticipation for the fight to start. Though it was a time to celebrate his eldest children's accomplishments, Hiashi insisted that Hanabi also take this opportunity to observe the other ninja and analyze how the Hyuuga taijutsu would stack up against them.

"Ok Hanabi-chan, what can you tell me about your sister's opponent?" He asked; eyes focused on his eldest child about ready to make her mark in this exam.

"Well, he's a puppeteer, if the bundle on his back is any indication…so he'll want to hide as much as possible to protect himself against nee-chan's attacks. But the byakugan can find him, and the jyuken can cut his chakra strings, so he really shouldn't have much of a chance against nee-chan." The young girl summed up, receiving a nod of approval from her father.

Down with Kankuro and Hinata, the signal to begin had just been given, and neither one had made a move yet, both were satisfied to just size up the other for the moment.

Hinata made the first move, running through seals and taking a big breath, before starting her attack. Inside he mouth, the chakra she was storing up was turning into water and she released it in a high velocity bullet.

From his vantage point inside the bandages on Karasu's back, Kankuro was going to have his puppet rush the Hyuuga girl, only to feel the cold point of a kunai in the small of his back…his real back.

"Hiding so close to your puppet wasn't very smart, the second Hinata said, and emphasized her point by applying a bit more pressure with her knife.

She had him beat, and good. The only option that Kankuro had was to give up and hope that Gaara didn't kill him for making the Sand village look like a bunch of fools. As he returned to the finalists' box, he saw his brother's look from the corner of his eye, and knew that things were about to get much worse for him, if this invasion didn't go as planned. The electronic board sprang to life again and began to select the next fight. When it stopped, Kankuro felt his stomach drop from his gut to his feet. The plan was almost completely thrown out the window now.

Sabaku no Temari vs. Akimichi Chouji.

Now, under normal circumstances, Temari might have decided that discretion was the better part of valor and withdrew from the competition, but with Kankuro making a mockery of Suna, she had a chip on her shoulder, and quickly snapped open her large battle fan and floated down to the arena, while Chouji, after receiving a last bit of advice from Shikamaru (something about how organizing a funeral would be too troublesome), made his way down the stairs to meet his opponent.

This match started similarly to its predecessor, both parties were happy to just stare the other down, formulating plans and plotting strategies for their own victory.

Temari decided that it was time to take off the training wheels, so to speak, and snapped her fan open, revealing all three purple dots on the inside of her battle fan. Assuming that she was about to attack him, Chouji quickly used one of his families clan techniques, **Bubun Baika** (Partial Multi-size) no jutsu, and expanded his arms until they were easily four times their previous size, and took a swing at the sand kunoichi, making leap into the air, but she was still able to complete her attack and Chouji couldn't defend his outreached arms from her **Kamaitachi** (Cutting Whirlwind) attack. Despite his best attempts at toughening up his skin, the attack still cut into his arms, almost removing his ability to use his hands, and thus hand signs, completely. His hands returned to their normal size, and Temari gently glided down to earth on her fan, a smirk plastered over her tan face.

Chouji timed his next attack perfectly; he curled himself into a ball and began to spin extremely fast, just as she touched down on the ground. The **Nikudan Sensha** (Meat Tank) was another Akimichi clan jutsu, used primarily as part of the Ino-Shika-Cho formation, but in this case, Chouji hoped that the rapidly rotating sphere would be able to break through Temari's wind attack. By the time Temari's feet were securely on the ground, he was hurtling at her, going as fast as a rolling human being can go. It just wasn't fast enough, and Temari swept her fan around again, releasing another gust of slicing winds. Though the rotation of Chouji's body helped push him through a little bit, he was still injured severely and was slowed enough on the initial swing, that Temari's second sweep of her iron fan lifted the human cannon ball into the air before dropping him unceremoniously to the ground, a mess of cuts and gashes.

Thinking the match over, Temari snapped her fan shut with ease and turned to the proctor for his decision. To her, and most of the crowds shock, Genma didn't call off the fight. Turning back to where the Akimichi had fallen to the ground, Temari was genuinely shocked to see a cut and bleeding Chouji stand up shakily and pop a soldier pill into his mouth. She saw the relief flood his face as chakra was restored to his body, and held her fan in a defensive stance, awaiting his next move.

The brown haired, big boned boy, had a serious look on his face, more reminiscent of Shino or Sasuke, than his usual self, and after that last run in with the Sand kunoichi's wind, Chouji knew what he had to do, even if it would use up almost all of his remaining chakra. He first used another clan technique, **Baika** no jutsu (Multi size), expanding his entire body, seemingly in preparation for another meat tank. But instead of curling into a ball and acting like a pinball, he ran through another set of hand seals and upon completion, slammed his palms to the ground, and fell to all fours. To everyone's shock (except Shikamaru), the earth from the stadium floor crept up along Chouji's skin until it covered his entire body, but it kept on going. Over his face, the summoned rock elongated and turned into a snort of sorts, and along his back, thins spikes of rock, more like the quills of a porcupine or hedgehog grew. Only when the quills were a menacing four feet high, bringing his already huge mass to a staggering seven feet high, and nearly twenty feet long, did he beginning to curl into a ball and begin to rotate.

"**Ishi Harinezumi** no jutsu!" (Stone Hedgehog technique) His deepened voice came from inside the rock animal and he began his attack. While it might make him much larger than his previous attacks, all the extra weight slowed him down, and Temari had ample time to launch another Kamaitachi at her foe, not expecting it to stop the boy completely, at least cutting through his armor.

To her horror, it did nothing except chip some of the rock along the base of the thin quills along the rolling wrecking balls back. She tried again with the same result. Now he was getting much too close, and she was forced to launch herself into the air to avoid the lumbering pin cushion. What happened next surprised everyone in the stadium.

Chouji stopped on a dime, right underneath Temari's floating fan. For a moment he just sat there, doing nothing, until he suddenly began to spin…backwards, in the same place. The previously damaged quills shattered and fractured along the small stresses that Temari had made, and as they snapped and impacted the rock 'skin' over Chouji's body, they ricocheted upwards, directly at Temari, who had to either move out of the way, or risk being impaled by flying stalagmites. She was able to push away just in time to miss the largest pieces of debris, but as the quills flew through the air, they shattered into more pieces, which rained down on her body and fan, tearing cloth and fan, letting air spill out from her makeshift glider. She fell the final twenty feet to the ground and lost consciousness on impact with the ground.

Chouji stopped rotating and allowed the rock to fall of his body and assimilate back into the arena floor. As soon as the last bit of rock fell from his shoulders, he too blacked out due to chakra exhaustion. Genma took a look at both gennin before announcing his decision.

"This match is ruled a double knock out, neither party will advance to the second round!"

Again, medics came out to the arena and took the two injured gennin to a field tent to check them over. Soon enough the board was back to its old tricks and the fourth fight of the chuunin exam final was selected.

Uzumaki Naruto vs. Sabaku no Gaara.

What were the odds? All three sand gennin fighting in a row like that? The crowd sure loved the order of matches so far, While most of the people in the stadium thought this would last about as long as the first fight, those who knew what was happening, knew that this had the potential to be the best fight of the tournament. How often did two demon vessels square off against each other?

Gaara teleported to the floor in a small twister of sand, while Naruto executed a perfect Konoha shunshin and joined him.

There was a lot of chatter going on in the stands while the crowd waited with baited breath for the start of the match. In the Hokage's box, the Sandaime was keeping an eye on his counterpart from Sunagakure. His two eldest children had failed to secure a win, in fact, the eldest hadn't even put up a fight, and yet here he sat, cool as a cucumber, eyeing Gaara, the youngest closely. Even if Jiraiya hadn't alerted him to Orochimaru's movements, Sarutobi would have been suspicious of the Kazekage's behavior. After the display by the oldest Sabaku children however, there was no doubt left in the old Hokage's mind. The body sitting next to him was Orochimaru, and the only way that today could end would be with at least one of them dead…

"I'm worried, Tousan." Hanabi whispered to her father as she watched her brother stare down the red headed Suna ninja. "Gaara-san seems very strong, what if Haran-nii can't beat him?" Despite his absence for large parts of her life, Hanabi had a very close relationship with her brother, part hero worship and part connection via the threat of the caged bird seal.

Hiashi tousled the brown locks of his youngest child, despite her annoyance at the action. "Don't worry about it, Hanabi-chan, your niisan has been working very hard for this fight, there is almost no situation that he hasn't planned for and can't get out of. He'll be fine."

This time, Genma didn't say anything, he just dropped his arm between the two gennin, and the fight was on!

Gaara's sand rocketed forward in a wave of grains and tried to entrap the Leaf gennin, only for Haran to duck under the wave and dash forward, kunai in hand, ready to take a whack at Gaara's body. To his surprise, a wall of sand rose up to protect Gaara from the blade of the knife, but by applying some wind natured chakra to the blade of the keen knife, Haran was able to slice through the tendril of sand that had dared stop his attack. He felt the sand from Gaara's initial attack coming back, and ducked again, while attempting a sweep kick, though that too was blocked.

Haran leapt away, there had to be another way to get through this sand shield without resorting to his new technique. Deciding to test out this shield of Gaara's, Haran threw a kunai into the air and formed a crossed shaped seal. Soon the single kunai was over a thousand, each one heading straight at Gaara. Again, the sand rose in a while to block the deadly attack at its master. Upon impact, all the cloned kunai poofed into non existence, leaving only the original to be assimilated into the sand.

"It's no use Uzumaki." Gaara growled. "You can't get past my sand."

"Never say never." Haran smirked, counting off the seconds before the explosive note he had attached to his kunai exploded, scattering the sand enough to expose the weapon, though not for very long.

It was more than enough time for Haran however, as a month of speed training with the Toad hermit had done wonders for the boy. He not only had to wear weights, but worked in a running stream and underneath a waterfall to build up even more stamina and increase his physical strength.

Haran had removed the weights before arriving this morning, the weighted suit he had been using wasn't made to be removed quickly, unlike the weights he had seen in many of the weapon and equipment shops he had been in.

Without the extra fifty pounds he had grown used to wearing, Haran was nearly twice as fast as before, and used this advantage to sprint forward and retrieve his knife.

Gaara was surprised that his opponent was so fast, not in his wildest dreams had he thought Uzumaki would be this fast. The voice of his mother began to call for the blond's blood, a sure sign that he would make a good opponent. He commanded his sand to attack, to seek out the blood of Uzumaki Naruto, but time and time again, the boy just evaded the sand and tried a different trick to try and bypass his **Suna no Tate**. (Sand Shield) Nothing had worked, of course, but the sheer tenacity the blond had was beginning to worry the Suna boy.

Haran's current trick involved a smoke screen and kage bunshin transformed into kunai that littered the ground. He would transform into a knife and wait for Gaara to come near, but before he did, he caught the outline of a large shape through the smoke. Quickly he activated his Byakugan, being careful to hide the bulging veins around his eyes, peered through the visual obstruction, hoping to glimpse what was happening.

Gaara had surrounded himself in a cocoon of sand, probably because it was the sand's way of preparing for the unknown, and a large eyeball sat perched atop the dome of sand. The entire thing was aglow in golden yellow chakra, showing just how much energy it took to keep this technique up and viable.

Deciding to continue the plan, but amend it on the fly, Haran created one more shadow clone and transformed himself into a kunai on the ground, before watching his clone rush towards the sand ball, wondering what kind of defense this would pose. It was a bit of a shock that the clone was able to reach all the way up to the mass without being attacked, but once it's arm impacted the sand it initially held firm, protecting Gaara completely, but then caved inwards, trapping the arm before a sharp tendril of sand speared through the clone's chest, ending that little experiment.

Gaara's third eye swept over the arena floor, looking for Uzumaki, that clone had been a good diversion, and now it was imperative that the genuine article be located, else he might be able to continue with his little guerilla strikes.

Haran had his plan set in stone now. This would end the fight, there wasn't any sense in dragging it out any longer than it had been going for now. Releasing his henge, the blonde reappeared in the middle of his kunai field, catching the blind spot of Gaara's eye, before he rushed forward, hoping no one would notice that he was going to be using the Jyuuken in this one strike.

In his right hand, he began to mold and spin chakra, an incomplete rasengan. Jiraiya had mentioned the technique once, and promised that if Haran showed enough patience and restraint, he would begin to teach it to the boy. This current form was only the first stage; ero-sennin would start teaching him the second stage after the exams. It would be more than enough now, after all, it's only purpose in this exchange would be to get rid of the sand between Haran and Gaara.

The swirling ball of chakra impacted the surface of the cocoon and began to spit and kick sand into the air, the tiny particles proving no match for even this weakened version of the Yondaime's original technique.

The opening wasn't very large, but Gaara's chest was uncovered enough for Haran to get a hand through and land a single strike to Gaara's side and then quickly retreat to safer ground.

Inside the cocoon, Gaara was shocked that this blond looser had not only managed to penetrate his cocoon, but had actually landed a hit on him. No one had ever done that, and despite the apparent softness of the strike, his side was now sore enough as to boarder on paralysis. Though it would take more chakra, he would have to use the **Suna no Yoroi**. (Armor of Sand)

* * *

The stadium was shocked, Uzumaki Naruto, the dead last of his graduating class, had not only been holding his own against the strongest of the Suna gennin, but had also shown an early version of the rasengan and then proceeded to actually hit Gaara!

From their seats in the shaded over hang, Hiashi and Hanabi privately cheered on their son/brother, the older thinking of how proud his wife would be if she were here to see how her children had grown up. Hanabi was thinking how strong her brother was, he hadn't even showed off that one move he had been working on…

* * *

In the Hokage's box, he too was feeling pride and wonder at the actions of his favorite gennin.

'Will the wonders ever cease with you, Haran?' He thought with a smile on his face.

Orochimaru was having far less fun watching his secret weapon getting made fool of. Before Orochimaru had killed him, the Kazekage had assured the snake sannin that Gaara was nigh unbeatable.

'Oh well.' He thought, tensing as the large cocoon of sand shrank and reduced until it was lying on top off Gaara's skin. 'If he dies it doesn't change my plans one bit, I would have killed him anyway once this was over with, my former associates can't be allowed to get their hands on him.'

* * *

Blue eyes met aqua, as Naruto and Gaara stared each other down, Naruto with an smirk of superiority on his face, and Gaara with anger and annoyance written all over his body.

"Gaara." Haran spoke, voice clear and showing no weakness or hesitation. "I've won this fight, even if you don't know it, give up now and you'll be able to walk out of here. If you insist on continuing this fight, you won't be able to crawl, let alone stand up after my next attack."

To try and intimidate Gaara into submission, he released enough of Kyuubi's chakra to equal that of Shukaku's, enough to let the demon inside know who his vessel was facing. For an instant, realization dawned on Gaara's face, for an instant he seemed unsure of himself, unsure of his chances of victory…and then Shukaku decided to step in. The tanuki's attempt to take over Gaara while he was awake caused the Suna gennin to grip his head in pain. The sand from his gourd and from the armor covering his body began to swirl around him violently before it began to settle on his left arm and the left side of his face, taking the appearance of the demon sealed within.

Now, just because this wasn't what Haran wanted to happen, didn't mean that he hadn't accounted for it. It was time to finish the match, and if Gaara did or didn't survive, the choice had been his.

Haran formed one seal. The ram seal, most often used when focusing chakra inside the body, usually as a precursor to chakra control exercises. The chakra Naruto was focusing on wasn't inside his body however; it was what little he had placed inside Gaara. That one strike had injected enough chakra to close ten tenketsu and seriously numb Gaara's side.

This was what Haran had spent almost the entirety of his training with Ero-sennin on this technique, and just as Gaara began to rush recklessly forward, Haran allowed his chakra to escape from three of the tenketsu they occupied.

Before Gaara had time to react to the tiny stinging sensation the release caused, a very large, very powerful bolt of lightning came down from a perfectly blue sky and struck the onrushing red-head. The bolt easily broke through the weak defense the loose sand around Gaara tried to put up, and then with similar ease, broke through the armor that was supposed to be impenetrable.

Gaara was knocked unconscious before he knew what had happened, and Shukaku was forced to divert so much chakra to regulating his host's heart rhythm, that he had no energy left to continue the fight.

Sabaku no Gaara fell to the ground and didn't rise. Throughout the stadium there wasn't a noise, there wasn't a sound. The expressions written across the faces of the spectators ranged from awe to shock to fear and back again.

From the gennin box, Kankuro was about to pee his pants from fright. No and absolutely NO ONE had ever beaten Gaara, and this kid had done it without a scratch on him! If this was the dead last, Kankuro hated to see what even a middle of the road gennin could do.

Of the thousands of people in the stands, the only one that seemingly had a clue as to what had just happened was Hinata and Hanabi. Haran had been practicing that technique, which he called **Kusari Raikou**, chain lightning. For every tenketsu Haran closed, by releasing that chakra, he could summon a directed bolt of lightning. The more tenketsu released, the more powerful the attack. Hinata had checked and if that was only three tenketsu, she shuddered to think of what someone would look like after five or even ten…what about the Hakke Rokujuuyonshou?

Hiashi wasn't sure if he should be more surprised at his son's technique, or the fact that his youngest daughter seemed to know what was going on. In the end he settled in with the crowd, in applauding an indescribable fight.

* * *

Ino couldn't believe it. Naruto, Uzumaki Naruto, of all people had just beaten Sabaku no Gaara, someone she had been specifically warned about by her father. Beside her, Sakura was in a similar state of denial. It wasn't until she noticed Hyuuga Hiashi, who was sitting just a couple of rows in front of her (she picked the seats she had because Sasuke was sitting further down the row), stand up and begin applauding politely. Amid the hollering, whistling and general ruckus, he seemed particularly demure, but if the head of the most powerful clan in the village could show his approval for the match, than she should have no problem in doing so too. Just as she was about to stand up and join the masses, she felt the beginnings of a genjutsu before she saw the illusionary feathers fall from the sky…

* * *

**(A/N: There you go, now maybe I'll stop getting so many death threats from the fans of this story. I have a very good reason as to why this took me 5 months, actually, I have many good reasons, I just know that you don't really care why it took so long, you just want to make sure that I don't take so long again. Completely understandable, but I'm afraid I just can't make any promises about an update schedule. **

**I will say this; more than 80 percent of the reason for my tardiness is writer's block/remorse. I had the most impossible time thinking of how to write the Haran/Gaara fight, going through everything from having a toad squash him, to…okay, confession time, I couldn't really come up with anything else…and since that idea sucked…no way I could write the chapter. I tried…and tried…and constantly came up with toads…and then one time I came up a different type of summon…but same way of victory. Not only is this way cooler, but I mean come on! It's way WAY cooler!**

**Anyway, thank you to all who reviewed the last chapter, and a special thanks to those of you who reviewed my story in the past month or so…at least the ones who didn't make a threat on my life.**

**Please review this chapter as you have done so faithfully for the previous 13, and I promise to try and be quicker with my updates. To try and help myself/reward you who have stuck with me, here's the synopsis of the next chapter…before I've even written it!)**

**CHAPTER 14 OF TRUE HYUUGA GENIUS**

**Haran will come out in the open, can't wait for Neji's reaction as well as Ino's. **

**Haran is uninjured and basically 100 percent, and now that he doesn't have to chase Gaara and Sasuke, where will he help out in this time of trouble?**

**Sasuke is still Sasuke, but he doesn't run out of the village to find a fight…what happens, who does he fight?**

**I think it's about time to reunite the first family of the Hyuuga…**

**And your last bit of info and probably the biggest departure from cannon AND fanon…the Sound four won't be casting the Shishi Enjin. They're in Konoha, but not in the box…**


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